Oh my, It's a GARDEN!

Over the last few weeks, we have been growing many, many plants and a puppy. Our very early mornings and mid-sleep pee breaks have kept us too busy to be doing much else. But we are loving it nonetheless! We have so many more puppy friends through puppy school and our romps in the park. And then she falls asleep on us...

We did have time to enjoy a great day for bbqing. We picked up two racks of side ribs and made our favourite ribs yet: a very easy recipe from Primal Grill, our favourite saturday morning television show about grilling. It is a bit like Bob Ross  but with charcoal and large chunks of meat, rubs and marinades galore. Use the recipe here, but skip the lemon bbq sauce at the end. The spicy rub and bourbon-cider-butter grilling juice are more than enough for a very nice dinner.

As a side for same dinner, we had a fresh batch of home-grown arugula in a vinaigrette. I harvested the arugula from our own garden shown below! Our friend, Andrius (shown below in white hat), has been our gardening mentor and has guided us through the growing process to lead us to this back-yard utopia of veggies! It is so rewarding to harvest from your own backyard. 

The pink Columbine (above middle) seems to pop up in cracks of pavement on sidewalks and between buildings. It is a beautiful little surprise all over the city! Look at that bed of lettuce, spinach, arugula, leeks, peas, chives, and tomatoes climbing in the back! Also seen are golden raspberries, wild strawberries, chives, cabbage, kale, radishes and some herbs. Below are my two favourite gardeners, my boy Tom and my little lady Ruby. Awww. Ruby has become a great little gardener, sniffing about but not stepping on anything! She has a green paw.

This weekend we got up early enough to hit the Palmerston Street Yard Sale, a wealthier strip in the hood that has good 'crap'. We came home with a new skateboard, some fenders, many new clothes, and a few cupcakes. Tom also found some 75 litre planters on the roadside and HAD to ride them home on his bike. They went into the garden as planters. Tom has set up a rainwater collection system in the back yard so that we just use rainwater to irrigate the garden. It's great living with a Mechanical Engineer.