Christmas is over here. I spent most of these days alone with my seed catalogs and my thoughts. I have busy month ahead with work and Dr appts. New year New me. And a birthday. I will be 58 and my goal is still to grow 90% of my food my time I am 60. Today I cooked ham and my sweet potatoes for dinner. I don’t like eating alone but it’s better than not eating : )

That rat is my nemesis. I've been aware of him for about 5 weeks now. I want to get rid of it before it mulitplys. Killing/capturing something that large is not easy, I'm finding out.

I have a camera set up to catch his movements. Of course its nocturnal and I only catch him active about half the time. It was completely inactive last week during the very cold weather. I'm hoping this warming trend will get him out more and I'm setting up a second live trap today.

The better solution, is for my neighbor to get rid of his big Mastiff dog ( that barks way too much in the daytime and tries to attack me through a stockade fence ) that has to live outside. Which means food/water has to be there to feed the dog and the rats. Been here 30 years and first problem with a neighbor, that I've had.

From my " This Day " pics, winter cover on the garden on Christmas 2015. I planted half the garden in brassica.

Seeds and seed starting supplies are out at Lowes. LOL!

I found last year that Home Depot had the largest selection of seed and starting supplies. I went looking for pickling cucumber seed and HD had many varieties while Lowes was sparse.

Lynn, I like the picture of the cover crop. I enjoy playing with cover crops/food plots. My plan now is to use some of my deer corn to plant in part of one of my fields this spring, if I can afford it. I hope to create a lot of biomass to till into the soil. This little farm has been in the family for 70 years, and I dont think anyone has tried to improve the soil in that manor.

Jennifer, don't ever remember gardening stuff out this early, but I am glad to see that someone is putting it out. I have a good supply of seed for the garden, but I need to buy seed, fertilizer, and diesel to work on improving the land. The land improvement may not happen.

Lynn, I have a huge problem with gopher, moles/voles, and rats. I am afraid to use poison, and also afraid of trying to shoot them. My last attack plan has been moving my sweet potato area, plus trying to use one of the larger tractors to pull a field cultivator through the soil as deep as it will plow, trying to tear up their homes. Moving the sweet potatoes seemed to help, but I doubt reducing the gopher population with the cultivator is going to work. Trapping gophers is a slow way to get rid of them, but I may have to buy more traps catch as many as I can.

I only use poison in a bait station like this

Bait Station

I have a pug and the neighbor has his big dog and I don't want to take a chance they get to the poison. I also don't want to poison rabbits, squirrel, possum, or the neighborhood cats that visit my backyard in the night ( they trip my cameras at all hours ) .

This bait station uses a stick of bait and there's bars inside that keeps the bait locked in place so mice/rats can't drag the poison out of the station. They will try to drag food to their nests.

My brother has used the bait station to get rid of rats feeding around his bird feeders. He put out two bait stations and have not found a sign of them eating the bait in 6 months.

When I first put them out the bait got eaten quickly. Then it slowed down to almost nothing. I've not seen any sign of bait being eaten in a month. But that big rat can't get inside the bait station.

The cold blew in this afternoon.

It's not pleasant out there at all. It was much better when I woke up this morning. The heater hardly ran last night.

Our neighbors are at Disney, so we are helping with their horses and mules. Not an enjoyable task right now. Nor is taking care of my group of furry and feathery friends. But, it's not as bad as last week. For that I am thankful.

We got our shopping done for the week this morning. Tom had a lot of leave left, so he's off work this week too. I have to work tomorrow, but we're on "skeleton crew" so it's the only day I will work. Two people each day is all that will be working.

Ethan is leaving for Oregon early Wednesday morning. We didn't need to buy much food really. We were out of all the animal stuff, so that's mostly what we purchased, and it didn't take too much time. Glad about that.

Early this morning, I tackled my clothes closet and got rid of 32 garments. Yay me! I also went through our kitchen utensil drawers and cleared out a box of stuff. Why does anyone need 20 paring knives or 4 carrot peelers?

I love, love, LOVE clearing out unused items.

My clothes closet is in our extra bedroom and the goal is to make that a nice, relaxing room for me to read and exercise and write. I'm trying to make that a reality. We have a small house and it's difficult to find places for things that people want to keep. We're making progress, though.

My seed starting shelf is in the room as well. I was able to get it cleared off. It had become a spot to put stuff for the last few months.

We had a nice holiday.

I received some lovely gifts. If you're my FB friend, you saw pictures of a couple of them. Mom gave me the colorful trays and pots that I've been wanting. It will make seeds starting so fun!

My daughter gave me a flower press. Can't wait to try it out! I want to grow a lot more flowers this year. I also received a couple of books and clothing and some lovely pottery. I have a thing for pottery for sure.

I might need to order a few more of the pots. These aren't from Bootstrap Farmer, but they're really sturdy and nicely made. They should last a lot longer than the ones I currently have. Nothing wrong with the ones I have, other than they crack easily. But, they were free and free is always good. I'll just feel really boujee using them. LOL

I saw Amy's post on FB about seed companies already being out -of -stock already. Maybe I'll spend some time this evening getting things ordered. I have a list somewhere.

Saturday is supposed to be warm so I will be repotting several things that I have had on the back burner since being sick, raining, then cold. Fruit trees and Iris are getting redone. I hope I can get it all finished.

Most of my veggie seed was ordered tonight! I don't order dozens of packages like a lot of you, so it's probably really not that impressive. LOL. I am happy about it though. I stuck to my list except for the Thai Kang Kob pumpkin. Has anyone tried it? It's a C. Moschata. Never noticed it until today. The plan is to put Seminole and the Thai Kang Kob in Charotte's garden.

I still need to order black beans, a few herbs and flowers. The Queenie zinnias! I need some of those. They are lovely.

I really should get my inventory done. I know I don’t need much and I can probably get what I do need at Calloways. They carry full line of botanical interests. Or the feed store.

Kim, Happy Belated BD!

I do love Botanical Interests too! I looked at their site last night but couldn't get my brain organized. I'm not usually much of a follower, but when R & R did the whole "basil tea thing", I got online and ordered several varieties of basil from BI. LOL I do love me some tea. I didn't start any of it last year, but it's at the ready for this year.

....and the Kajari melon. I just want something pretty in my kitchen garden on the north trellis. Sorta a follower on that one too. It's ordered.

I feel pretty good about the seed situation. In the late summer/fall, I cleared out a lot. It will be good to start this year with a smaller, fresh situation.

I'm no minimalist, but it's so much easier (for me) when things aren't so cluttered and there's not so much.

It's not easy with seeds, though. Especially pepper seeds. I want to grow all the varieties, but not this year. This isn't the year for that.

My table in the shop had gotten out-of-control over the past few months. I'll slowly start getting it sorted through. There were several of those little seed starting trays that I drew at the SF (from Bruce. Kim, I think you got some too) that have been piled up on that table. I soaked them last night and now they're washed and ready to go.

This morning, I've been working on the extra bedroom. The desk specifically. Why do we have 10 notebooks, a dozen spiral notebooks, many composition notebooks, folders by the dozen, packages of lined paper. I'm donating almost all of it. Our kids are out of school now. I'll keep one of each. Other people can use these things and they're doing no one any good sitting in a desk at my house.

There's also a ridiculous amount of (still good) colored pencils, crayons, index cards still in the packages. Most it is being donated too.

I am keeping a couple of coloring books that I found in the desk. My Star Wars coloring book from when I was a kid. Hello 1977.

(Speaking of....I just started the Obi Wan series a couple of days ago. I'm only 2 episodes in....but I really like it! ObiWan is my favorite Jedi. And I like Ewan McGregor)

I have about an hours worth of work to do outside. The coverings need to be removed from some plants. We'll soon see what survived the cold last week.

I'm especially hoping the broccoli made it. They are beautiful plants, but only one has been harvestable size.

Tom is on his way back from driving Ethan to the airport in Dallas. I've enjoyed having the house to myself.

When he gets back, we'll probably take another load to donate.

And maybe grab a couple of storage boxes.

We're going to try to do a couple of date nights since we're both off of work.

What's everyone else up to this week?

I ordered most of my seeds this week, too. I'm putting in an order at SandHill preservation center, which I'm adding to as I remember other things. I decided I needed open pollinated carrots. I like Napoli, but it's a hybrid. It has a very early DTM (55 days). Most OP varieties were much longer DTM. I hadn't paid much attention in the past, but probably harvested other varieties too early (with poor results). But in Oklahoma the heat comes before a 70 or 80 day carrot can do it's thing. Maybe I should grow those in fall.

mostly I tried to replace old seeds, and then I found out I had ordered some of them LAST year and not taken them off my list.

It may be the year of the pepper here. I was looking for seeds of a special pepper Nancy gave me 2 years ago. Found it at a place specializing in peppers and OMG some COOL peppers. Couldn't resist. Expensive seeds. I also bought some new tomatoes, which I said I was through doing. LOL. Where will i put it all?

When I'm better organized I'll do a new thread with a list.

My keyboard is fighting with houzz, so I'm going to sign off.

XOXO

I have some trouble with Houzz also, but, I cant say it is all Houzzs fault, some of the problem has to be with my lack of computer skills.

My onions and garlic look very bad, I am not sure they will recover. The onions and garlic could have been planted deeper. On our coldest night it got down to 1 degree, and was below freezing for a long time.

I am really proud of my wife, she has been looking after me, and, feeding the deer. Madge has taken to our RTV. Since I have been sick, she gets a can of corn, and, and a can of cattle cubes and takes them by the creek and tosses them out. I did have a couple of game cameras set up where we are tossing out the food. I am not sure how many pictures I have, but it is well over 3000.

When I type in houzz, the I does this "i I" sometimes when i try to fix things it ignores where i put the curser and deletes from the previous position. This only happens in houzz.

Larry, I'm sorry you're not feeling well.

This week my son is moving to Stillwater and we've been babysitting. I just heard the younger brother yell "I hate you" at the older one. They just went outside. Tomorrow we plan to go to Bartlesville to see my sister. My project for today is to call the hairdresser and schedule haircuts for daughter and me. Hmm, and order prescriptions. I put both tomato list and pepper list in separate threads.

Larry, I'm sorry you're not feeling well.

If posting at Houzz on a tablet is anything like on my iPhone, I could understand why people wouldn't want to post here. It is SO annoying. Fairly easy on my laptop.

We woke up and went to Neighborhood Jam for breakfast. We don't go often, but it's one of our favorites. Even their eggs taste good. I do think they buy local when they can. Maybe that's why?

Tom is out in the shop trying to get some things organized. It's an ongoing battle.

I worked on my jewelry cabinet this morning and seriously cleaned out half of it. A lot of costume jewelry that I don't wear is going away.

I got stuck watching Buried Secrets of the Bible on National Geographic and need to shut it off and get back to work.

Amy, I saw your pepper and tomato threads. I'll head over and post before getting back at chores. I did realize in the middle of the night, that I forgot to order Jet Setter seed.

I sure hope we don't deal with the potting mix issues of last year. What a pain that was for so many people.

Did anyone take any of Dawn's frost blankets a couple of SFs ago? Tim offered us tubs of them, but I only took one blanket. It is the best. It's very thick. Anyone know where she got them? I'll ask at the Originals thread too.

I spent 30 minutes looking for binder that I thought had Garden journal blanks in it… apparently I purged those. Hmm. Notebook paper it is then. Cover pages were saved though. This year I really want to keep notes like I used to. I enjoy looking back seeing what I did and did not do. And what worked well. Started page one closing out 2022.

I had so much fun. I cleaned out over 20 pots of Iris mostly and I am going to plant in big mineral tubs. Hauled 5 carts full of trash to dumpster. Plastic does not hold up in Texas sun very well. Piled all empty pots so Sister in law can look through them. Tomorrow I will pot up Iris. Worn smooth out but feeling good about the progress.

Well, this is the last day we get to screw up this year, If we are going to stay in tune with the rest of 2022, we need to think really hard and come up with one more super flop we can toss in this year. I have had a good onion year, and okay sweet potato year. The crazy weather has been my largest drawback, plus our outside watering was cutoff was the final nail in my garden coffin.

I hope to use the (3) 275 gallon totes I have to set up a reserve watering system for a few vegetables. I have no idea of the best spot to set up my backup garden. The handiest spot to have access to water would be over by the pond, or, by the two wells I have access to, all which are a long way from the house.

Here I am trying to plan for next year, and I am not 100% sure I will be able to finish this year, but I guess that if we were 100% sure of anything, plans would be unnecessary.

I have a case of Cabin Fever, this wearing pajamas 24 hours a day stinks.

I didn't get Garden 2022 cleaned up yet, Larry. Normally, it's tidied up by now--asparagus ferns cut and taken to the burn pile, cages stored away--stuff like that.

I'll have extra work this spring getting ready for spring plantings.

I'm not exactly sure what happened this year. Maybe one thing is, I often worked on my day off (part-time job) because the woman I work for is caring for aging parents and has to get them to doctor appts. etc. I'm happy to do that for her. But, it does cut into gardening time.

I've had a weird urge to clean up around here. Sort through and organize and get rid of unused items. Ladies, it's sorta like the nesting instinct that we have when our babies are about to be born. It's that kind of urge. Only not exactly.

Hopefully it's just a weird thing and something bad isn't about to happen that would cause us to need to leave or change in someway. I don't know how to explain it. It's probably just something weird and random.

So, do y'all only use black-eyed peas for New Year's Day. Or do you consider any cow pea acceptable? lol

I have some soaking right now, but it's a mix of all the different cowpeas from 2020. They still smell and look good. But they're not black-eyed peas. Maybe I'll grab a can of them to keep it official.

Most of my seeds have already arrived. I'm still waiting on the Persian cukes from Renee's and the SESE order.

Jennifer I have had the same sense to purge for several months. Minimal mom is my favorite yt channel and Joshua Becker. They have inspired me to go all in out all out as the case may be. I am only keeping what I need, love and use. And a few family heirlooms. Simplifying my life so I have energy for what’s really important is the mantra. Focusing on relationships gardening health wellness are of utmost importance to me this year. I have been collecting 5 gallon buckets at work and Walmart when I get a chance. I am repacking much of my stuff for storage into those because they don’t get too heavy for me and pulling big totes out of the loft full of stuff is dangerous for me. I am going minimalist in most areas but not really garden seeds. I still have a dream to have a large place to plant all the beautiful things and 25 different types of pumpkins etc. so I continue to save seeds of all types. I need very few things for this growing year. I found a5 gallon and a 2 gallon bucket full of sprouting seeds. They are so old not sure of they will sprout but thought I’ll try and if it doesn’t work I’ll feed to the chickens. I have been rethinking my yard and how I am going to lay out smaller area. The chickens have been working an area for me to rid it of weeds and grass. I just need to frame it in. I feed them there and they fertilize for me. I am going to cover soon and start a new area. I think it is best to let chicken poop sit for a few months before using it right? Cow peas are tradition for New Years. Not sure variety matters.

I read you should wait 9 months on chicken manure, but I had mine scratch up a garlic bed and used it immediately. We lived. Apparently chicken manure can carry e coli and the like. But your chickens are new, I assume healthy, so probably safe.

We were supposed to have a traditional southern New years dinner, but Ron found a deal on lamb yesterday so he's blowing off tradition.

BTW Ron has decided we need to "declutter". Sigh.

Happy New Year to you all.