Bonsais and mulch

Which have nothing to do with each other.

After a lecture (of sorts) from my garden neighbor, I decided to mulch my garden. Not having any mulching materials readily available, I headed over to my friend Sam's house to pilfer some from the streets. We grabbed some giant leaf bags and started shoveling grass clippings in. At one point, her neighbor came home as we were gathering grass clippings from in front of his house. He looked at us like we were crazy, then started laughing. I doubt he thinks we're crazy, just a bit eccentric. I got two giant leaf bags of clippings, which covered about 2/3 of my garden, which isn't bad. I'm curious to see how much it helps keep the weeds down and the water in. But so far, my garden is doing great!

One of my experiments this year is corn. I bought quite a few corn plants, some organic and some regular. I honestly can't remember which is which, but one group is doing far better than the other group. this is also the first time I've planted herbs other than basil, and they're doing better than expected at the moment. The beets are doing great! I picked a few the other day and roasted them, and they were delish. I'll have to plant more the next time around. I love beets. I pulled all of my shallots and I'm getting ready to hang them in my closet, the only cool, dark, dry place that I house. I also have a few volunteers, which I think are melons left over from last year. I don't actually remember what type of melon they are, but I know I didn't get the same kind this year, so I'm very hopeful they'll turn out to be good.

On a somewhat related side note, I've decided to take up bonsai, although probably not too seriously. Just a bit seriously. We'll see what happens. For now, I have two starters and no tools, so I can't do much other than just keep them alive (which is going well so far).

So if any of you want ideas for birthday gifts for me, bonsai tools and a tomato machine would be awesome!