Thursday, October 19, 2006

Digging, digging, digging

She considereth a field, and buyeth it: with the fruit of her hands she planteth a vineyard. She girdeth her loins with strength, and strengtheneth her arms (Proverbs 31:16-17).

I just realized it has been almost a month since my last post. Sorry about that. I have been digging the garden to have it ready for spring planting, and I go to bed incredibly tired. I am gradually getting used to the work, but at first I just ached all over from using muscles I didn't know I had. I have been digging by hand (meaning with a shovel, not a tiller), paying three of my younger children a quarter a bucket (5-gallon size) to pull rocks out. We are almost done, then we will get a load or two of horse manure from the horse farm behind us, dig that in, and let it rot over winter. I am in a hurry to get this done before the ground freezes. We've been blessed with warmer than usual weather lately, but we've also had a lot of rain. (On rainy days there's enough to do inside to keep a person busy for the next 30 years.)

I never saw such a rocky piece of ground in my life. When we get finished, I'll take a picture of the rock pile we're making and post it. Every day that we are able to dig, we haul an average of six wheelbarrow loads out of the garden. Anybody have any ideas on what useful things can be done with rocks? They are mostly round, so if I was going to build anything (like a fence or a fireplace) I'd have to use cement.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

your greatgrandmother had them make a lovely raised flower bed with rocks they took out of her yard. I guess you remember the raised flower bed? You could even make a raised vegetable garden for some special plants? I don't know where she got the dirt to fill it but it lasted a long time. And a lot pictures were taken in front of it.

Granny Kate said...

I thought of that, but those were flat rocks. I'd have to use cement with these round ones. I might do that, though. Just have to decide on a permanent location. Just think: another flower bed for future generations to pose in front of! Wouldn't it be interesting to line up all those photos!

Anonymous said...

This is one way of communicating with your daughter.

Granny Kate said...

More than one way to skin a cat! :)

Anonymous said...

Cale always uses rocks when he tamps in a fence post. We stack any rocks we find around a tree and when he puts in a post he gathers them up. He says it makes the posts much stronger. -Melissa