Gardening Tip

In a few weeks we will be moving into a house...our first house ever. So, I guess this means that I'm setting down some roots in Texas (well, we already knew that we were here to stay a while...though we kept saying we were going back to California for the longest time). I'm very excited about having my own space, no one living under me (so I children can stomp around to their heart's content), a separate room for my littlest (who's been sharing ours), and a long awaited REAL garden. I've gotten pretty good at container gardening, but it's frustrating that the plants that grow "wild" in the lawn downstairs from the seeds my potted morning glory drops do better than the ones I tend and care for upstairs. But I do have a few tips up my sleeve, and I thought I'd pass along one of the best ones to you all.

My favorite Texas container gardening tip is...get plastic plants! No, really, this is a real gardening tip...resulting in actual live plants!

Let me explain. For several seasons I tried to grow plants from seeds in containers on our sunny apartment porch. No luck. They would sprout, and then the first hot day would hit them and they would wilt and die. I finally gave up...stuck some plastic plants in a pot full of soil I had tried several times to grow seeds in, and let it sit there on my porch. Rains came. Sunny days came. And then one day I look down and see something sticking out of the plastic plants. It's a REAL plant...a petunia which grew from formerly planted seeds, protected from the sun by the plastic plants. I checked and there were several other plants growing under there (different kinds...I forget now which ones, because I had tried planting several). I left the plastic plants in until they were about the size of the store-bought varieties and then took the plastic plants out and they did great. Then I planted some seeds in another pot and moved the plastic plants over them...and once again, they grew and thrived.

And the great things about this method is that you don't have empty pots sitting on your patio while you wait for your seeds to grow!

On May 9, 2009 you can join Stamp Out Hunger in providing food for needy families by leaving non-perishable food donations in a bag next to your mailbox for your letter carrier. What could be easier than that?

On a related note, did you know that canned food expires? YEP, that's right. So do many boxed products. I like to go through my cabinets once or twice a year, toss the stuff that's past the expiration date, and donate items that I might not get a chance to use before they expire.

What state SHOULD I live in...

Well, this quiz says Texas....

Which Large U.S. State Should You Live In? Your Result: You Should Live in Texas Capital Austin Largest city Houston Largest metro area Dallas–Fort Worth–Arlington[1] Area Ranked 2nd in the US - Total 268,820[2] sq mi (696,241 km²) - Width 773[3] miles (1,244 km) - Length 790 miles (1,270 km) - % water 2.5 - Latitude 25° 50′ N to 36° 30′ N - Longitude 93° 31′ W to 106° 39′ W Population Ranked 2nd in the US - Total 24,326,974 (2008 est.)[4] - Density 79.6[5]/sq mi (30.75/km²) Ranked 26th in the US
You Should Live in Georgia
You Should Live in New Jersey
You Should Live in Florida
You Should Live in California
You Should Live in Illinois
You Should Live in Michigan
You Should Live in Ohio
You Should Live in Pennsylvania
You Should Live in New York
Which Large U.S. State Should You Live In? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Was slightly surprised it picked Texas for me, even though I'm here and all. Though, I'm not going to take a quiz too seriously that picks NEW JERSEY for my second choice. Really? You think this mountain/ocean/open spaces loving girl would like New Jersey? OK...so I've never actually been there but I think the only nature they have is a swamp.

But of course these are taken with a grain of salt. There are several "What state should you live in..." quizzes around and others picked Alaska (love to visit, don't think I'd want to be there year-round) and Georgia for me. Ah, well...I was bored.

Californians are so Californian

A recent study that found that Californians are...well, Californian.

Dennis Tootelian recently announced the results of a survey that has people outside the state no doubt saying: "See, I told you." Among his findings: 63 percent of Californians have actually hugged a tree; 24 percent have surfed; and 21 percent admit to enjoying mud baths.

"It turns out that Californians actually do a lot of the things that make up the stereotype," says Mr. Tootelian.

...read more about it here.

Oh, and thanks to The Common Room, the blog which point me towards this fun if not all that surprising story.

Free Wildflower Guide

Wildseeds Farms of Fredricksburg, TX offers a free catelog which also doubles as a Wildflower Guide. There's some seriously good info in there--8 pages of instruction on how to grow wildflowers, and 25 pages with pictures of wildflowers along with their foliage and maps of where they grow naturally (so you could use this to identify that pretty flower you discovered on the side of the road) .

Texas Giveaway

Stumbled on this giveaway for the Disney on Ice Show in Dallas. It's a blog giveaway, so there's a good chance to win!

The Craziness of Law

I've been following news on the CPSIA (a recent overarching law that is a real mess for children's hand-crafters, booksellers, and thrift stores). But anyways, that wasn't what I came online to chat about today. You see, one of the side affects of my research on that is I've discovered some really good blogs along the way. One of them is Overlawyered.com. My reading there the last couple days lead me to some interesting news items related to California and Texas.

It's not unheard of in Texas for a small town to use motorists passing through to fund it's police department (I personally know of a little stretch of HWY 35 where the speed limit dips from 70 to 65 for no aparant reason except to trap moterists with tickets--and there's not even an offramp to the town that polices that stretch). Well, seems that the town of Tenaha, Texas, is going even further by using a law that grants authorities the power to seize property used in crimes to take stuff from people who were never even charged with one.

Meanwhile, there's a posibility California may be releasing 25% off it's prison polulation. Yeah...you heard that right. A three judge panel has concluded that because of overcrowing the only way to avoid unconstitutional prison conditions is to impose a "cap on the prison population." More on that HERE.