Well, it's that exciting time of year - the gardening season! This year, we planted a few different items, so we'll see how they turn out. We planted squash, zucchini, cucumbers, lettuce, spinach, chives, onions, peppers (yellow and red) tomatoes, basil, oregano, wildflowers, irises and lilies! I'm hoping the irises and the lilies (the bulbs we planted last year) will actually hold off on blooming, and then we can use them at the wedding. Except, I have no idea what colors we planted, as they didn't come up last year.

We planted everything form seed, except for two tomato plants (the tomato seeds we planted haven't come up yet, and last year, this was our most successful crop). This is also our first year with lettuce and spinach, but they are ready for picking - we'll enjoy a nice salad this week. In the below pic, you can see how tall the flowers already are in the back.

Last year, my favorite part of the garden was the squash (although, we had a TON) and the cucumbers (just for the cucumber salad. So good). I'll keep you updated on how it goes this year and hopefully have some notes to take away from what worked. Um, and what didn't.

On another note, this double rainbow was just outside our front door, beautiful Colorado sky:

And, just for fun, here is a great pic of Zoe enjoying her bone in the snow under the hot spring sun (taken in April):

That's all for now - I need to get back to obsessively watching the Phish setlist from Camden unfold.

Tags: eco-friendly lifestyle, phish, gardening

What is everyone doing to reduce their footprint? I'd like to think I'm relatively eco-conscious, but I know there is a lot more I can be doing. I live in a built green, energy-efficient town home, use all compact fluorescent bulbs, have energy efficient appliances and try to use recycled paper products as well as chemical-free cleaning products.

However, I could; buy all of my groceries locally (when I can), ride my bike more often, use reusable cloth bags when grocery shopping, could have used green paint when painting my house, and the list goes on. It's difficult financially to be 'green'- ah, different post for a different day.

Here are a few tips floating around online today that I don't normally see in the popular posts about how you can lead a more eco-friendly lifestyle:

• A reusable mug: Maybe I haven't noticed this because I don't drink coffee, but for those of you that stop at Starbucks every morning - this is a great tip, much less discussed than the reusable tote bag.
• Get your ice cream in a cone instead of a cup: I very rarely get ice cream without the cone, but will make the environment over calories argument a permanent change.
• De-lint the dryer to improve the efficiency: I think most of us probably do this, but did you know we're saving the environment, too?
• Use safe paints: I mentioned this earlier, however, I learned a cool tidbit from a Home Depot employee a couple of weeks ago. Boulder has the highest amount of 'Green' paint sales than any other Home Depot in the country. I also recently learned that the busiest Whole Foods (according to annual revenue) is the Boulder location. I guess that shouldn't come as a surprise.
• Shut down your computer: We all know this - but how many of us just hit stand by because we don't want to boot it up again when we log on next?

That's all for now. If I run into any other 'less familiar' green tips, I'll post them. Hope everyone is having a good Earth Day and is doing at least one good deed for the environment today! I'm gong to try to clean up trash in my neighborhood (I live in a construction zone) during the second intermission of the Flyers game. I know, not much, but at least it's something.

Tags: earth day, eco-friendly lifestyle, green tips, go green