Watching my plants grow...

...has become my new daily obsession. Call me weird, but to me, its just facinating! Here are my pole beans and bell pepper plants.

Garden Update

This summer my pet project has been learning how to grow herbs and vegetables in my own garden. Its been a lot of fun and educational as well. I posted pictures about a month ago soon after I planted. Here are some updated pictures. Its amazing to look back and see the difference in size.....watching it every day I forget how small the plants were when they were originally planted. The green onions will probably be ready to harvest in about a month. I just harvested the lettuce which made an excellent salad! In the garden, you can see the bare spot where the lettuce was. I learned that lettuce grows best in cool weather, which is why it started getting wilty when the weather got warm. So, now I grow lettuce in pots (pictured with my newest herbs I have yet to plant, Thyme and Oregano) so that I can move it to the shade or even inside depending on the weather. My hope is that I will be able to grow lettuce year round, so I plant every 2 or 3 weeks so that I will always have a steady supply. I learned that marigolds are great at keeping insects away, so I planted several randomly around the garden. Since my last garden posting, I planted green beans, which are climbing plants, which is why they are up against a wood support. I also planted squash and cucumbers (see the picture with the water bottle turned upside down....my new make-shift continuous watering system). The squash (on the right of that picture) is growing much faster (or maybe its just a bigger plant) than the cucumber. I also planted bell peppers next to my beans. The plants are still very small and I don't think they actually are visible in any of my pictures. I'm really, really hoping this turns out well and I actually get a harvest. So far, it looks pretty good and I've really enjoyed spending time weeding and watering. My herbs are doing fantasticly.....the plants are growing so quickly that I can't use it fast enough!

Cake, Cake, Cake

Here are a few more pics I wanted to share. I wanted to make a special cake for Alayna, so Gavin helped me make both the big version and Alayna's special cake. Although its far from a professionally made cake, Alayna loved it!

Birthday Party in Washington

Here are some pics from Alayna's birthday party at her grandma's house in Puyallup.

Alayna's First Birthday

It finally happened....Alayna turned 1!!! To celebrate, she received two parties; one with Chad's family in Washington and another with friends here in Portland. Here are pics of the party here which we had just yesterday. Originally, we had planned go to a park and have an outdoor event. However, the weather had other ideas and we moved our event to Papa's Pizza, a fun restaurant with a huge indoor play park.