Tried to log in to work from home this morning and just got the 'clunk' sound. Kinda makes me laugh, that clunk, as it sounds like something mechanical went wrong. But something quite electronic was keeping me from logging in. Luckily, my son does hardware support at my office so I put him on the task. I won't go into the details here, but I blame the security system at work that keeps all the computers up to date and cleans off things from our computers that it 'thinks' don't belong there. And of course, there's the problem. A program, no matter how smart, can't really think, and so it deletes permissions and setups here and there. Nobody really knows what it's doing. After an hour and a half of troubleshooting, I told my boss I'd rather take the day off and get some stuff done at home. And so I did.
Did a couple more patches of lasagna mulching amongst the myrtle. This is coming along well and goes a little faster each time as I get the hang of it. I've modified the program a bit. Instead of newspaper, peat moss, grass, peat moss, I leave out the first peat moss and just top it all with peat moss. As it gets watered in over the coming days, it all mixes together anyway, so why give myself an unnecessary step. The grass definitely spreads more easily dry and I will try to keep up and use my grass clippings right away every time now.
I think the people driving by must think I'm crazy working out in the hot sun on that hillside. They would probably just plow all this myrtle under and re-landscape some other way. So many here hire yard people -- I'm talking homeowners who are the ages of my kids! These young familes clearly are not geared to taking care of their own yards.
But as for me, I have strength and energy, I have newspapers and grass clippings. I have hundreds and hundreds of myrtle plants. Why not use all these things if I can? Why spend money to put in something else? The only thing I need to buy is the peat moss. (which is quite expensive at $13 for a 3 cu yd compressed brick). By the way, I figured out how to get that huge brick up my steep hill without carrying it. I just roll it end over end. You must be resourceful when you aren't strong enough.
So now I'm finished with outside work for the day. I will run the sprinklers a little later just in the areas where the transplants are still getting started. But now I'm going to clean up and go get a nice bottle of wine as my friend has returned from points north and is coming over to see me in a couple of hours.
7 comments:
It's true. I can't complain.
Used to tell my exhusband that women were smarter because we could not muscle our way through a problem and had to think around it.
I walked out in my back yard today where I am thinking of putting the rock garden and thought of your lasagna gardening to expand it and a couple bushes into a kidney shaped island flower bed.
My question is how much newspaper is this going to take? I can rake up the grass clippings from the riding mower or actually put my grass catcher on the walk behind. So I don't think clippings are the issue. But we have a weekly newspaper so don't get a lot of that unless I have all my neighbors collect or start picking up the Albuquerque paper regularly.
I put the newspaper down two sheets thick and overlapping (sometimes more only because I grabbed more than two sheets). We have some free weeklies here that I pick up every week at the grocery store, plus I get the Sunday paper, so that's plenty for me. Be sure to use the absorbent newsprint and nothing glossy or coated as it won't break down easily.
So far I'm having good success with it keeping the weeds down in the areas I've done. I do have a problem running out of grass clippings, but every week I get more of those and can do a few more sections.
Personally, I don't see the point of multiple layers of peat moss.
If you have any dried leaves, those make a good layer too. I don't and won't have any now until the fall.
Good luck with the flower bed. It sounds like something nice.
Hi Bekkie!
How was your day off?
Did you and your friend polish off that bottle of wine?
hehe...
Hope you had a great weekend.
Hi Jacqueline,
The day off was so productive around the house and yard. And we did our best with the bottle of wine, but since we rarely have more than a glass or two, there was half a bottle remaining. But it was a lovely evening and just about a perfect day.
Well gosh, now I feel like a lush..lol...
Happy Monday to you--and thanks for checking out my blogs. :-)
Nah, Jacqueline, we're just a couple of lightweights.
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