Rainy days and deadlines

I should have known. I always work better with a deadline.  I bet you’ve noticed that I’ve been…well…absent from the blog lately.  I’ve been writing half-posts and not posting them, taking half-hearted photos, but really trying to avoid posting anything…

My raised beds aren’t done yet.

There, I said it.

I’m not making excuses, but I will say that sometimes I have to just say no to stuff sometimes.  After I posted, I was thwarted by windy weather from clearing the yard, the first step.  The following weekend—Easter weekend—I did manage to do a TON of raking, and actually got my husband to trim the weigela and other small bushes and trees in our yard.  He cut back the vines on the pergola and cut the tall prairie grasses.  I called a friend who came over and dug up the Autumn Joy sedum, some lavender and some lambs’ ears from the future raised beds site.  And then I realized I’d overdone the yard work, and would need a few days to recover.  Never fear, planning can be done comfortably from the couch, I told myself.  I asked my husband about what supplies we already had, and what we needed to buy; his answers were rather vague, but it seems we might have enough wood for a structure, and possibly have some landscape fabric, and could/might/maybe have something for vines (tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, etc.) to climb.

Then I recovered some energy just before the Illinois Marathon; I did the 5K Friday evening with my son and a friend with her baby on her back, and the 10K the next morning with other friends.  Then my husband was traveling for a conference. Then the rainy season started.  The forecast is a seven-day series of cloud and lightening bolt pictures.  A friend posted on Facebook, “Is there anything better than the sound of steady rain when you just finished planting seeds?” To which I replied, “Is there anything worse than the sound of steady rain when you know you should have already planted seeds?” 

But I have been emboldened by another friend’s comforting words, when I asked if it’s too late to plant a garden. “It is almost never too late, but you have to be flexible with the crop.”  I know it’s probably way too late for lettuce, for example, but I might be able to put some plants in, just to get a little kickstart this year. 

And then I got an email from our local co-op, which was sent as a mass mail, but seemed to be speaking directly to me:

The email read:

Do you have big plans for your garden this year?

--Why, yes I do!, I answer

Let us help take a load off your work. Local farmers have already started your garden!

--What a relief!

We’ll have tons of heirloom tomato plants, bell pepper plants, hot pepper plants, a wide variety of herbs and other vegetables – perfect timing for getting them in the ground for the season.

 [Angels singing.]

Come to find out the prices are extremely reasonable, and proceeds will be donated 100% to a program “which strives to make healthy food accessible to people of all economic levels by offering access through price and education.”  Local farms are donating all the plants!

[More angels singing.]

I immediately forwarded the email to my less-than-enthusiastic husband, and told him we now have a deadline (and I’m sure he’s wondering how he got to be a part of “we”), so we have to get going on the beds.  I assured him he would enjoy the fruit of his labor, so to speak. I’m feverishly waiting for his reply.  We all work better with deadlines, right?

So, hopefully we’ll see (there’s that “we” again) progress on this project in the next week or so.  We have a busy weekend ahead, and it’s the first weekend of the farmer’s market.  If I can drag him there, he might be persuaded to build the boxes after seeing the prices of goods at the market.  Fingers crossed!