Nelda's Rain Report: Saturday

Saturday - 6/30/07 - We didn't get much of a drying out, but the sun did shine for a little while on Friday; however by 6:30 p.m. Friday night the rains were back with us. We had a hard rain during the night and when I checked the rain gauge this morning, we had gotten 1 inch of rain.
TOTAL 5.3 inches since 6/25/07

Friday - 6/29/07 - Only at trace of rain fell between Thursday and Friday morning.
TOTAL 4.3 inches since 6/25/07

Nelda's Rain Report

Thur - 6/28/07 (7:00am) - We finally got a little break in the rain. Yesterday's 24 hour total was only .5 inch. Carlene's sunflower is really amazing. It is the size of a dinner plate. I think it is the only thing in the garden that loves all this rain.

TOTAL Rainfall: 4.3 inches since Monday 6/25/07

Rainfall in the Garden

Nelda and Gary Wallace have a rain gauge in their garden and are reporting the amount of rain we're receiving.

Since 7:00am Monday, June 25, we've had a TOTAL 3.8 inches of rain.

We received 3.4 inches of that total between 7:00am Tuesday, June 26 and 7:00am Wednesday, June 27.

Zapping Mosquitoes!

Howard Garrett has this article, Cinnamon Oil Kills Mosquitoes, posted on his website, The Dirt Doctor.

Click here to read!

Helpful Garden Bugs

Thanks to Jeff Jekel for providing this great link!

Helpful Garden Bugs


The Neighbors GO! for Southern Denton County published a story with photos on the Garden Grand Opening in the June 9th edition.

MEET YOUR NEIGHBORS: Spinuzzi Family

Gardener Name(s): Lewisville Fire Department c/o Michael and Diane Spinuzzi and our children, Madilyn and Connor.

I grew up in CO and have lived in the area since 1995. I am a Paramedic Driver/Engineer for the Lewisville Fire Department. My hobbies include cooking and photography as well as all kinds of music. My wife is originally from Long Beach, CA and has been here since 1993. She is a Loan Officer.

I grew up in a family that grew everything. All of my grandparents as well as my parents had lush gardens. I can always remember having every type of fresh vegetable available during the summer. It was often a friendly competition amongst the family to see who had the better garden.

The Lewisville Fire Department (LFD) was approached with the opportunity to manage a plot. The members of LFD always try to give back to the community in any way we can. Growing food for the local food bank is just another way the LFD can share and grow with the community.

I grew up pulling weeds and watering gardens. I am still learning so much about organic gardening and I have had some pretty good success. Work with the Texas soil though has been more of a challenge than I expected though. And while I do have success with vegetables and flowers, I can't keep an herb garden alive to save my life. Aren't those supposed to be the easiest things to grow? HA HA

The LFD OTCG has cherry tomatoes, slicing tomatoes, chillies, red bell peppers, cucumbers, squash and cantaloupe.

I want to grow enough vegetables that we can provide an abundance back to the CCA Pantry as well as spread some of the harvest through the fire stations.

The Spinuzzi Family can be found tending plot #A2; stop by and get to know them!

Mark Your Calendar: June 19 Garden Party!

MEET YOUR NEIGHBORS: Beverly Michelson

My name is Beverly Michelsen.

My hobbies besides gardening are reading, camping, and sewing. I love my church and my church family, and now my new friends from OTCG are pretty special.

Originally I heard about the OTCG meeting in our water bill back in January. I decided to see if there was a trick to gardening in TX because it's a big challenge! I was raised on a farm in southern MO and even through we had lots of rocks our soil was very good.

I have tried for over 15 years here in TX to garden and some years are good and some were very sad!

I have two plots and in them I have several kinds of tomatoes (and worms), peppers, yellow squash, cucumbers, and flowers.

I am hoping to be able to supply CCA with a lot of veggies as well as my own family.

I have learned a lot about TX gardening from everyone especially Al and Gary. Also I was happy to learn about composting.

Beverly also serves on the OTCG Executive Committee as Historian. Stop by and get to know Beverly; her two garden plots are directly behind the arbor.