Nestling Leaves

Isn't autumn beautiful?

Answered Prayer...in Progress

Remember this post?

God provided the shredder!  Okay, it's not exactly what we had in mind:  it's pretty old; it's only a shredder and not a chipper, so we can only shred branches up to 1/2  inch in diameter; it doesn't work.  Yet.

Here's what we've learned from this: when a person offers to sell you an item whose functionality is unknown for a certain price, offer half that amount until it is known if the item is in working condition.  If it works, pay the full balance.  If it doesn't work, fix it, then negotiate a lower price and pay the balance of that reduced amount.

We thought of this after we discovered that the shredder doesn't work.  Paul's still working to fix it.

But we don't regret the $20 we spent on it.  With the trimming we'll continue to do on the fruit trees, we'll have plenty of opportunity to use it.  And wood chips are far more useful to us than a column of smoke and a pile of ashes. 

Yeah, it's pretty old.  Pray with us that replacing the coil will be easy and cheap.  =)

Floating Row Covers

They might not be pretty, but Paul made them from the materials we had on hand, and they will provide the greens that extra layer of protection that they'll need when it gets very cold.

And just what are the floating row covers protecting?

Lettuce (without that little weed in the foreground; I plucked it after I saw it in the photo):

Spinach, with onions in the background:

The successive plantings of radishes:

And the mâche:

We've read that it's important to keep the plastic from touching the leaves so that the condensation won't freeze the leaves to the plastic.  Our row covers float over the large raised bed about 15 inches from the box and about 12 inches over the narrow bed.  Hopefully this will be enough to keep everything protected from both the harsh winter and the moist plastic.