Our Vegetable Garden -- Ready For Planting

With temperatures stretching close to 95 degrees on Saturday and Sunday, we bravely resolved to get outside and put the finishing touches on the garden. We are proud to say the 17' x 6' garden bed is level and finally finished. In order to keep the bed separated from the neighbor's fence, I cut a piece of pressure-treated plywood to run along the back and framed it in with timbers. I also buried about 15 feet of 1/2" tubing from the garden faucet for the drip irrigation system. Add 11 cu. ft of garden soil and 5 cu ft. of organic compost, and we are finally ready to plant! The strawberry plants from last year (bottom right corner) have survived and can count themselves as the first official residents of the new bed.

Before:

After:

Fill Dirt

Next step on the road to a raised garden bed: fill dirt. I found a guy on Craiglist looking to get rid of some dirt he dug up from the basement of his mother's house. Soon he was at my doorstep with a pick-up bed full of soil. After hundreds of shovelfuls and at least two dozen trips with our recently procured red wheelbarrow -- we ended up with this ...

Brother. And Sister-in-Law.

So, I only have one brother, but I suspect that if I had another one Casey would still be my favorite. And he couldn't have picked a more perfect wife. I've been looking forward to him and Kim coming to visit for, oh, ever, and there was a slight second of despair today when I dropped them off at the train, knowing their visit was over. But oh, so fun.

On Friday we did the gorgeous drive to Charlottesville, where we took in a lot of Thomas Jefferson and some pretty spectacular flowers. Jason and I had only been there once, one fall years ago, when the leaves were all turning colors. It's a toss up which is prettier, spring or fall. Kim's one request for the trip was Indian food, so we had dinner at this Himalyan fusion restauraunt. The food was good, but not good enough for the hour-and-a-half wait between ordering and diving in! Good thing we like each other!

Saturday was gorgeous, and we ventured out to Eastern market for the first time of the year, then we navigated the crowds at a couple museums. Sunday we went to church and then to Korean BBQ--the first time since we discovered Il Mee with Shaanti and Adam last summer. Mmm, tasty.

We also just hung out, which is always my favorite part of any family visit. Casey and Kim like the same TV as we do, so we watched "The Office" then had them introduce us to "30 Rock," which is finally growing on me. Casey and I have always had eerily similar taste in things, and when he recommends something for me (David Crowder Band, "The Sting," "X-Files," any YouTube link he sends me, etc.), I am bound to like it, so it was pretty easy to find "30 Rock" hilarious with the two of them.

Good, good times. I'm so glad they came!

Easter Travels

It was nice to get out of Dodge this past weekend. I headed out to Idaho early in the week to travel a bit for work and attend some meetings with my boss, then Thursday afternoon Jason came out to join me for the weekend. Usually our trips to Idaho are crazyhectic, but somehow we managed to balance this one out just right--we sprinkled the weekend with a few key events (Troy's dedication, the new Brazilian restaurant in Boise, Easter service, coffee here and there with friends, celebrating Jenny's birthday) and then filled in the rest of the time with simply hanging out.



I love that my sisters and their families always spend as much time as possible with us when we are in town. We hung out on Friday afternoon and dyed Easter eggs with Cole on Saturday night, then on Sunday the whole family spent the day at my parents after church for a big dinner, egg hunt, and game time. We had a great time with Cole, Troy, and Mason, who are all getting so big--it seems crazy (and sort of exhausting!) that by the next time we all get together, at least one more boy will be running around!

By the way, don't you adore their matching Easter outfits? For more cute pictures, see the Flickr link.

Spring Project

I like to think my car has become as of late an urban pick-up truck. We are constantly amazed at what we can fit (nine 8-foot long landscape timbers in the picture). The guy at Home Depot who helped me load the timbers noted that it was an "awfully sporty" pick-up.

So, why does one need 8 foot boards? I got this crazy idea that a level and landscaped garden would be much greater curb appeal than the sloped vegetable garden we launched last year. So, I decided to construct a landscape box. I did quite a bit of research on do-it-yourself sites and thought I had it all figured out. The project is progressing well, but it took some engineering wizardry and a lot of work with a level, as you will see when I post the finished photo (hopefully later this week). Stay tuned ...

Best Day Ever

So, not only was yesterday the annual Taco Bell Reception on Capitol Hill (seriously, the day all staffers live for--the elevators were full of interns hauling as many soft tacos as possible back to their offices), but there was this too.

Yes, I'll be staying after to sign autographs.