spoiler alert: clay and hatchet are villains

ok, truth?

i went to school with the boys and they went nuts over freedom in the courtyard! they ran and explored...

while i 'set up shop' (rolled the dolly with wood on it around to the place where i needed to build the raised bed). rolling a heavy dolly with no sight line of the wheels was a test of my maneuvering ability. i got it around the curves in the sidewalk without losing any wood, and without the wheels falling off the sidewalk. (who's the winner? MEEE!!!)

once i was in place, i stood there and looked at "ALL THAT WOOD." oh goodness. what have i gotten myself into? it's kinda like when you decide you want to eat something and your eyes are bigger than your stomach. then i shook it off and wondered where to begin. so logically i began with the posts. i spent way too long trying to use the hatchet that i had purchased and the points that it produced were shoddy at best.(this is what happens when you use a dull hatchet blade..oops).

so i ditched that effort after two janky posts and decided to turn the compost-i had to put the dogs in their pen while i did that because i was worried they would come over and try to jump in the pile... and get bitten by the ants that currently reside there decaying our dead stuff. then i spent a good portion of the rest of the afternoon trying to clean up the flower bed around the gazebo, which took forever because i had to dig up the irrigation hoses so that they were above ground.  once i finished that, i was kinda' a muddy mess. but i still needed a whet stone to try to sharpen the hatchet.

so we went to home depot.

while bruno was shouting "GO FASTER!!" chaco was pleading to go slower.

 i tried to sharpen the hatchet, but the next day-it wasn't any better. boo. so i resorted to a saw that a friend lent me to cut down a sapling. i was able to create somewhat of points/edges...enough to get them into the ground anyway.

 once all of the posts were ready, i pulled out the post digger, the pick, the shovel and eventually a small hand shovel. time to dig holes. i forgot that soil here is 99%clay, 1%pride...CLAY IS MY NEW NEMESIS!!!! cursed be the clay. my dad suggested that i double what stood above the ground...that would've meant a 30 inch deep hole...umm..once i started digging, i was defeated about 2 inches down. there was no way i was getting 30 inches into this ground! it was a mess. i was a mess.

since the holes weren't going to be 30 inches, no way, no how...i took the next best measure. i cut them to size. so now i would only have to dig a 15 inch hole. this was more feasible, only slightly less difficult. 15 might as well have been 30. when i finally got the posts in, i set the bottom boards up to make sure that there was going to be no issues. at this point, there had better be no issues.

day two finished.

day three: all i had left to do was screw the boards into the posts. and that's what i was kinda thinking...screw the boards. so pulled my little drill out of the closet. and it had no charge. i'm pretty sure it didn't have a charge the last time i charged it. i should have just spent the money on a good one the first time around. but i don't drill enough things. so i went to the store and purchased a 20v black and decker matrix. i then had to return home to charge the battery...it took about 4 hours, but i was able to get back up to the garden before they shut the building down!

 i finished one raised bed-two more to go. i think i will be getting some student volunteers to help me out with the next two. (no hatchet...or anything that might damage limb or phalanges). 

 once that was done, i knew that the custodial staff was going to need the dolly, so i unloaded the wood onto some pavers under the awning and figured i'd come back with a tarp. weeeeellllll.....i really didn't want to come back, so instead, i looked around my office to see if i could find something to cover up the wood. i DID! i found some fancy table cloths that worked just fine, then i brought the cart back in and said goodbye to judy, our head custodial person in our building. she said she wasn't sure if she would be back on monday or in her new building. so i may have been the last person at cabell to see her for the last time. (we'll see come monday).

all of that and to be quite honest, i am surprised that i am still moving! hatchet, sawing and digging muscles are just not used nearly enough! forget the gym...garden and build! not only is it a workout, you get your vitamin d AND nothing beats the feeling of being productive!

go forth and be productive~
julie

p.s. the best part so far was watching the boys play! this was the first time that we play outside and when i throw chaco's toy, he fetches it...whenever we are outside, he is usually too distracted to play fetch. so i tried again when we went to our little dog park here at the complex and he was all about it-we've had a break through! from now on, the dog park will be much more fun!