Friday, August 25, 2006

I'm trying to make my own compost

We live on clay. Our backyard turns into a swamp after it rains because the water does not drain - because we live on clay.

The woman who owned the house before us planted a perennial garden in the backyard. It wasn't a nicely planned garden. It really isn't a garden. It was several small areas planted with perennials throughout the backyard. In the clay.

Over the past three summers I've tried to move perennials, plant some new ones, replan what already exists, resod some of the weirder spots, etc. It was a difficult task - trying to dig up plants and plant new ones. Because we live on clay.

In the spring of 2005 I decided that I wanted to try to make the flower beds better by adding some compost - and what could be eaiser than creating your own? Um, yeah. I found some plans for a compost bin on the internet, went to Howstuffworks.com to find out how to make compost and sent Dave to Home Depot for the materials. He made my bin within 2 days and we set it up in the back corner of the yard.

Last summer it was great. We put all of our food scraps in the compost bin. We put the grass clippings from the 2 times we mowed the lawn (remember the drought of 2005?) in the compost bin. We put the raked up leaves in the compost bin. And I, with my big pregnant belly, tried to turn the compost every other day to give it oxygen. Um, yeah. Obviously ours was a slow-making compost process because we didn't have compost at the end of the summer like my high hopes had been.

This year I've turned the compost 1 time and I've put about 12 eggshells and 1 1/2 cartons of bad strawberries in there. I'm so good at seeing projects through to the end;)

QOTD:
Am I a nutcase? Y or N?
What has been your dumbest yard project?
getting to know me in 100 days - day 9

6 comments:

kkoois 5:35 PM  

answer to QOTD #1 - uhhh...yeah, you're a nutcase.

answer to QOTD #2 - buying a house with a yard.

Anonymous 7:47 PM  

1.) Yes, you are a nutcase.

2.) Completely redoing our HUGE flower beds here at The Money Pit!!! We should have left them, or at least, done a little at a time.

kkoois - ROFL!

Anonymous 6:39 AM  

1) YES :) :)
2) I can't even keep a hanging basket of flowers alive, so I don't attempt yard projects...I leave that to Jared, and he usually has success. :)

Mommy Brain 8:09 AM  

1. Yes! Your just like Doug...who also made his own compost in the back of our old house. I've never seen bugs like there were on that compost pile!

My question back to you is why not just buy some black dirt and sand? That usually breaks up the clay pretty well and doesn't cost much at all. It's a ten dollar fix at the most.

Doug says...be sure to water the pile...this is coming from an expert remember. = )

Carol 9:14 AM  
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Carol 9:14 AM  

Nutcase? I'll go with your BFF and say yeah (but I've met her and she is a nutcase, so is her answer accurate?)

Yard projects? Last year I wanted so badly to get rid of all the dandelions in our yard, that I vowed to pull each and everyone of them up by hand, with a screwdriver like tool, by the root and all. I am superwoman - I do not need Weed-B-Gone! Reality check: I am not superwoman; I need more than just weed-b-gone; I still have lots of dandelions in my back yard.

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