Ewww. I don't like tree people. Never have, LOL. I don't like garden gnomes either, though...
I've been staying busy. With my husband's medical situation needing extra time/trips, plus spring planting season, and work, I've had little time to spare.
I hit an awesome yard sale last weekend - lots of great stuff (yard stuff, garden things, and TOOLS). I brought home a lot for a fair price. Between that and a good day at the thrift shop the day before, I now have four soaker hoses that cost me almost nothing. They'll go in the garden FOR SURE.
I've also been planting fruits. So far, we've planted 3 apple,2 peach, 2 apricot, 2 native plum, 1 regular plum, 5 grapes, and around 8 or 9 more raspberries, plus 3 gooseberry this year. I also dug and planted a new perennial bed and a rosebush. The little spring garden is going and I transplanted tomato seedlings to larger pots the other day. I also bought a small hydroponics setup (used) to test my hand/liking at that method of growing. If I like it, I'll be building a LARGE setup for growing greens (LEGAL greens) indoors year round to reduce costs for us. The investment in a home built hydro system shoudl pay for itself in months, not years. I'm all about investing this way...it's more sure than the stock moarket, let me tell ya!
I've got more fruits ordered and on the way. I'm waiting on one last grape, 2 cherry trees, 6 lowbush blueberries, and 2 currants. Oh, and a lilac bush. I still need to get my asparagus crowns in the garden, too.
This year will be heck keeping everything watered...all those plantings need watered every 3 days or so. I'd like to set up an irrigation system but won't be spending on that this year. Maybe in a year or two...
I think I'll rig up some sort of system to use the water that collects in the swimming pool. I have a sump pump that we use to drain it. I just need to get some longer sump pup hoses (or figure a way out to use our pool vacuum hose, which I already own. POndering all that...definitely would reduce my water bill. Then, all I have to do is pump down the pool often enough to keep it from getting green.
