Bean Snapping, Front-Porch Style

"What you preserve is the cheeriest momento mori.  It is a way to say and mean: of everything that passes, this is what I choose to keep.  It is a clear reminder, there for the tasting, or where and when and how you lived."
                                                            from Tamar Adler's An Everlasting Meal

Girl 2's green bean patch is loving life right now.  We prefer our squash, zucchini, and sugar snap peas fresh rather than preserved for later use, so while those are filling our dinner plates, we're mostly saving our beans for later.

We snapped all of our beans together on the the front porch.  It just seems right to keep up the old tradition of front porch snapping.  When I tried to explain to Girl 2 that we were keeping an old tradition by snapping beans on the porch, she said, "oh, so that you can watch the cars go by while you're working, I guess."  

Of course, I love the fresh veggies that our garden provides us.  Yesterday, I snapped a cucumber off the vine, rinsed it with the garden hose, then munched on it while I walked the back field with the goats, sharing the stumpy end of it with a very thankful Razz.  That type of experience is hard to beat.

But, seeing all the jars of preserved food lined up neatly in the pantry runs a close second.  Just knowing that long after the garden beds have returned to their winter slumber, we'll still be enjoying the bounty of the harvest is comforting in a way that I'm sure we can only imagine today.  Back in the days when people weren't watching cars whizz past as they snapped their beans, I'm sure those beautiful jars brought a sense of security -- an ability to rest in knowing that as the days once again shortened, the table would not be empty.

Now, for a little teaser.  Don't miss tomorrow's post!  I'm so very excited to be featuring my first ever guest blogger.  I don't want to give too much away, but be sure to check back in tomorrow and read a touching column title "Living with Perspective."  And, speaking from experience, remember that the best way to show your appreciation of a blogger is to leave a comment!  Let's show our guest some love tomorrow.  If you enjoy the post, let her know!  :)

Organic Pest Control

The garden is in full swing!

This means, of course that it's prime season for my arch enemies, the squash bugs, and other garden pests. 

Luckily, though, we've got the organic gardener's best friend -- a chicken tractor!

Pictured at left, the chicken tractor gets moved daily from one 4'x8' plot of land to the next.  Currently, John has it slowly circling the garden.  The chickens love to eat any type of bug they can get their beaks on, so they are doing a pretty good job of keeping garden pests to a minimum. 

Last year, we kept the goats in the pen inside the yard quite a bit. We saw a couple of ticks on the goats, so John started moving the chicken tractor around the goat pen, and we never saw another one.

We quit using pesticides on our lawn several years ago.  Since then, the front yard has become basically overgrown with weeds.  The backyard, however, is mostly lush, green grass.  That's because not only are the chickens great at munching pests, they also love most weeds.  So, with each new patch of ground they encounter, they are munching weeds and fertilizing the grass -- not a bad deal at all!

Lots of folks keep chickens in a stationary pen.  I'm sure this has lots of benefits.  But, we love our chicken tractor because it always keeps the hens on fresh grass and does wonders for the yard and garden all at the same time!

Real Men Eat Veggies

There are a few men in my life (I'll not name names) who think a meal is not a meal unless it involves meat.  Luckily my husband is not one of them.  Men like that would hardly get a real meal around here these days. 

There is one slice of bacon on this plate, so maybe it could pass as a meal.  ;)

With the garden in full swing right now, we're up to our ears in veggies.  It almost feels wasteful to dive into the deep freeze for a chicken when there's almost more than we can eat ripe for the pickin' in the backyard.  Clockwise from top left . . .

Toasted homemade sun-dried tomato/mozzarella bread topped with sauteed beet greens

Bacon-wrapped green beans in brown-sugar glaze

Fresh, raw carrots (if you've never had one straight from a garden, you're missing out.  No need to cook these; they're perfect as is)

Olive-oil fried squash

Sugar snap peas with red pepper

Sounds like a pretty yummy meal to me!

Show-off-y Squash

This is one big plant.  The garden box it's planted in is 4 feet wide, so that gives you a bit of perspective.

The cute little squash it's producing are only about 5 inches across.  That's a whole lot of showy leaves for very little table-ready produce.  When you're using the square-foot method, like we are, big plants had better produce big yields or they're not worth their space.  I suppose we'll just have to wait and see how prolific these giant plants will turn out to be.

When my Mamaw was here this past weekend, she remarked that she hadn't seen this type of squash in quite awhile, but that it brought back memories for her of her family's garden years ago. 

That's one of the special things about heirloom varieties -- they're not the varieties you might find in the Garden Center of your big box store, but they are varieties that seed savers have been keeping in the family for generations.  This Yellow Scallop squash seed came to us via Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds and is a good example of what heirloom gardening is all about.

Tour of Five Acre Farms

Tuesday morning, Little Boy, Girl 1, and I joined some Mom Group friends for a tour of Five Acre Farms in Pleasant Plains.  Five Acre Farms was founded 4 years ago by Brandon Gordon and is now operated by he and his wife Catherine.  Just off Hwy. 167, they're in a prime location for selling to locals, but their biggest earner is the Searcy farmer's market.  Additionally, they arrange through email for Wednesday drop-offs in Batesville, providing a range of items from not only their farm but also other vendors who sell at the Searcy market.  They've begun sourcing a Searcy restaurant and are looking into doing more of that in the future.

While not certified organic, Five Acre Farms does use organic methods and is a great option for local shoppers.  I love being able to walk through a garden and sample its contents as you go;  no need to wash off the pesticide residues first.

A roadside stand offers a shaded place for displaying today's goods: some yellow squash.  A large hoop house can be seen in the background of this shot.

They use permaculture, which is a no-till method, so their one big rule for visitors is not to step into the beds, which would compact the soil and potentially disrupt the microbial life beneath its surface.  Despite not having been tilled, the soil is surprisingly loose.  They top beds with what Gordon referred to as silage, his version of which is cast-off already-decomposing hay that has been chopped up into small pieces.  It seems to make a great mulch.

This is a look inside one of their large hoop houses.  In the winter, it's used as a cold frame and grew lettuce and other greens all winter long.  This summer, they've lifted the sides to provide airflow and added a shade cloth in hopes of warding off the blistering some of their peppers and tomatoes suffered last growing season.

They use several different methods of trellising.  Here is an interesting trellis used to keep their heirloom tomatoes upright.

They had a couple varieties of kale, which they say is in pretty high demand at market right now.  This variety was new to me and is a red leaf that is both cold and heat tolerant.

They get a lot of customers at market who are seeking out more local foods, which is great.  However, they noted, that those shoppers come with a  shopping list of items including tomatoes in April.  It seems we've become so conditioned to shopping our grocery stores that we've forgotten what it is to eat seasonally.  We need to reconnect with the ground and with what it provides us in each season.  If you're buying a tomato at a farmer's market in Arkansas in April, you'd better be suspicious.  Rather than let our menu dictate our shopping lists, we ought to generate our menus based on what's fresh and in season at the market.  Like in the chicken-or-egg riddle, it's the in-season food that should come first, not the menu. 

 I greatly enjoyed getting to meet these two and tour their farm.  Though I'm sure they had tons of work that needed to be done, they were very gracious hosts and their enthusiasm for their work was evident. 

  Contact Gordon at 5acrefarms@gmail.com to be added to the Sunday/Monday mail-out related to Batesville delivery.

Snap Pea Pasta: Some Recipes Write Themselves

By the looks of this mixing bowl, it's sugar snap pea season!

Like lettuce, this is a crop best enjoyed fresh, so I don't put it by for later.  Taking a cue from Tamar Adler's An Everlasting Meal, I created this little concoction which is so simple it allows all the ingredients to speak for themselves.

I sauteed the pea pods and some cherry tomatoes I had on hand in some olive oil, garlic, onion, salt, and pepper,

then dumped them, along with some Parmesan cheese, atop a mound of cooked rotini.  The olive oil on the veggies was really enough to oil up the pasta, and the dish was tasty and beautiful in its simplicity.

First Big Garden Harvest

When my little gardeners joined me in the garden yesterday, we all enjoyed getting our hands dirty together.

Girl 1 brought in the first batch of carrots from her plot.  They were a little small, but she was just too excited to wait and immediately ate them all for lunch.

Unfortunately, the cabbage loopers joined us in the garden, too.  They were all over my precious kale. 

I had Girl 2 put some water in the bottom of a bucket and set Little Boy, my little caterpillar hunter, to work picking them off the leaves and throwing them into the bucket.  A few minutes in, he looked into the bucket and, shocked, proclaimed, "Momma!  The caterpillars can't swim!" 

As I explained that we were trying to kill these caterpillars because they were eating our garden up, a look of horror spread across his face.  "But, Momma, I LIKE caterpillars!  I do not want to make them dead!"

And, just like that, I lost my good help.  I did pick up some Neem oil today to spray on the kale, so hopefully that will clear up the problem.  I've never used Neem oil, but my organic gardening guide recommends it for heavy infestations. 

Besides the carrots, we also brought in sugar snap peas and beets.  Mmmmmm.

DIY Composting Toilet

So, either you're convinced or curious.  Either way, welcome back to our discussion of our new composting toilet.  (If you're lost, you need to read yesterday's entry about why I built one and why you should, too). 

Most of what you need to build your own, you may already have lying around. 

So, go gather up these items:

milk or filing crate

5-gallon bucket

scrap wood for the legs

toilet seat

zip ties

Tools I used:

pocket knife

jigsaw

chop saw

scissors

drill

I did have to buy the toilet seat (the cheapest plastic version I could find was $9 and change); everything else we had on hand.

1.  Place your 5-gallon bucket under your crate, and using the pocket knife, score the crate just outside where the bucket is to mark where you'll cut with the saw.  You want the bucket to just fit through the hole you'll create.

2.  Remove bucket and use jigsaw to cut along the line you made, creating a circular opening for the bucket.

3. Using the chop saw, cut the 4 legs to a length that just allows the bucket to peek above about a 1/2 inch.  I think I cut my legs 14.5" long.  (I spray-painted mine black to match the crate with paint I already had; while this does make for a nicer looking backyard 5-gallon-bucket pot, it's not a necessary step.  :)

4.  Attach the legs by threading zipties through the crate and tightening them around the legs.  Use scissors to snip off excess.  My zip ties happened to be black (how fortuitous!), so they are difficult to see, even in a photo.  Sorry.

5.  Attach your toilet seat.  My crate didn't have holes where I needed them, so I had to drill some.

6.  Set your finished toilet over the bucket and you're ready to go! 

I think we may add a toilet paper holder to the side, but I'll have to check the store for my options on that.  Since this crate lived a previous life in my high school English classoom, I removed a label from the front that read "Makeup Work."  I suggested we replace it with another one that says "Making Doo."  That idea was immediately shot down by very literal Girl 1 who was quick to point out that it doesn't work because we'll only use ours for #1.  Oh, well.

By the way, Little Boy is definitely the biggest fan of the potty thus far.  In fact, my plan to cut down on the flies let into the house when he runs in for a quick potty break is totally backfiring on me.  He's actually making extra trips outside just so that he can use the new toilet!  What is it with boys and al fresco urination?

I didn't take pictures during the process, so my explanations may be difficult to follow.  Please message me or comment with any questions.

Why I Built a Composting Toilet and Why You Should Too

I know that lots of you already think we're crazy around here.  For those of you who haven't yet made that judgment, let me just get this over with and move you over into the "Yep-They're-Crazy Camp" -- I built a composting toilet.  And we intend to use it.  Probably in the backyard.  Much like an outhouse.

Since I feel I may need to reel you in on this idea, let's devote today's post to WHY one should build a composting toilet and allow tomorrow's post to explain HOW to actually do it. 

Why Build a Composting Toilet:

(Okay.  I'm not going to get into the whole Humanure debate here.  We intend to use our toilet to catch urine only.  So, my arguments assume a #1-only potty.  If you're unfamiliar with the humanure debate and are bored, just Google it, and you'll have hours of entertaining reading.)

1.  You get to use power tools!  Don't let that scare you off, this thing came together in the span of about 15 hands-on minutes.  And, I guess, the fact that you get to use power tools is maybe not the most important reason to make a composting toilet, but it is the most exciting part of the process.

2.  Human urine is nitrogen rich.  If you grow a garden (or just pretty ornamentals), your soil needs regular fertilizer to keep plants productive and healthy.  Developing a compost pile is a must for the serious gardener.  But, studies show that the urine/compost combination is even that much more powerful.  So, why not just go pee on the plants?  Straight urine is too potent for plants and needs to be watered down.  Our plan is to empty our potty onto our active compost pile.  This will speed decomp and add nitrogen to our pile.  Rain will serve to dilute the urine as the pile develops over time.  Now, even if you do not have a compost pile, you can still use urine in your garden or flowerbeds.  Experts disagree on the urine-to-water ratio that is appropriate (suggestions I've read range from 1:3 to 1:10), but all advise that you apply your urine/water combo a few days ahead of a planned harvest.

3.  Who couldn't use an extra toilet?  We're thinking our toilet will live somewhere outside.  Especially this time of year, we spend large chunks of our day outdoors, so this could cut down on, say, the number of flies let into the house by Little Boy when he runs in for a quick pee before returing to his dirt pile outside.  Girl 1 refuses to use the new pot unless I enclose it in some way like a port-a-potty, though I was just thinking we'd hunt down a good, private spot that's not viewable from outside the yard.  We'll see. (For the record, Little Boy is pretty excited about the new potty and wanted to be very involved in in it's construction.  Girl 2 just shrugged her shoulders when I asked her how she felt about it, but she is thankful I've chosen not to include the photo I took of her trying it out.)

4.  Pee is free and abundant.  I guess you could go buy bags of nitrogen-rich fertilizer for your garden, but, if you have to stop for a pee while at the big-box store making your purchase, don't miss the irony.  Why not make use of what we already have?

5.  Our toilets use approximately 6 gallons of water per flush.  In our family of five, our flushing adds up to a lot of natural resources consumed in water usage, sewage treatment, etc. Generally speaking, less flushing is better. 

This may seem gross, but a lot of times (especially at night) we subscribe to the "if it's yellow, let it mellow; if it's brown, flush it down" philosophy.  This cuts down on flushing, but you can only let so much paper accumulate before a flush is necessary. 

Using the composting toilet regularly could greatly cut down on our environmental impact.  I mean, why would we want to expend valuable resources to dispose of something that, if harnessed, could actually be beneficial in growing our fruits and vegetables?

Instead of wondering why I should build a composting toilet, all of these reasons make me wonder why I haven't built one until now!

I realize, though, that this isn't for everyone.  And some of you may be thinking, "Remind me never again to accept the surplus vegetables Ashley offers me at church!"  :)  But, if you're at least a little intrigued, check back tomorrow to see how to build your own out of items you may already have lying around.

Solving a Garden Timing Issue

I grow cilantro in the garden for use in salsa.

But, the cilantro is enormous and about to go to seed.

Meanwhile, the tomatoes have yet to set any fruit.

And, I grow dill for use in pickles (and if I'm being honest, because fresh dill is one of my favorite smells ever and I've been known to just go dunk my head into the plants and take a few deep breaths before moving on with my garden work).

But, the cucumber plants (in the far left row), are still squatty little guys.

What to do? 

Dry the herbs to save for later use, once the tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers are ready.

Last year, I hung herbs to dry, which is a completely acceptable way to go about it.  I read, though, that using a dehydrator is the prefered method because the more speedy drying time preserves more of the flavor.  So, out comes my handy-dandy dehydrator (for being what I think is the the cheapest kitchen appliance we own, this thing is proving to be quite useful!).

Here, I have the cilantro leaves, ready to be dehydrated.  Eventually, the leaves need to be separated from the stems, and I find it easier to do this work on the front end before everything is so brittle and more difficult to handle.

Unlike the cilantro, I allowed the dill to overlap a bit.

Dehydration only took a few hours (and made the entire house smell great!).  Once finished, I dumped the brittle leaves into a big bowl . . .

 . . . and crushed them up into tiny flakes by grinding them between my fingers -- this was definitely the most fun part. :)

For storage, I poured them into jelly jars with air-tight lids and placed them in the pantry to wait patiently for the tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers to grow.

Problem solved!

A Berry Good Time with Girl 2

As I overheard to Strawberry Shortcake just the other day, I commented on how annoying I found all her berry puns, and here I go using one in the title. :)

Anyway, yesterday Girl 2 helped me gather berries.  It was a hot and humid afternoon, so her help was greatly appreciated as it sped things up. 

3 things I noted from our time together:

1.  She was focused.  She is definitely our most, umm, easily-distracted child.  She jumps from activity to activity like a butterfly from flower to flower and hasn't the patience for most things that require lengthy focus.  But, she worked steadily alongside me for fifteen very-focused minutes.  Perhaps it was that it was physical work or that she had the payoff of uninterrupted time by my side, but it was good to see that she can focus in on something when she wants to.

2.  About halfway down the patch, she said to me, "Hey, Mom, I was thinking, instead of putting all the bad berries in a pile for the chickens, maybe we can keep the ones with only a little bit of a bad spot and just cut off that part.  Less waste that way."  I think my heart skipped a beat!  It's wonderful to hear your kids apply on their own the philophies you build your house around and hope they're picking up on!

3.  As we neared the end of our work, she popped up from her crouched position and exclaimed, "Mom!  Look at this one!  It's like the perfect berry!"  as she held up a big, plump, perfectly red berry, and we both admired it glistening in her little hand under the sunlight.  "Can I eat it?  Just this one?"  And, then I watched as she ate that juicy, perfect berry with such a look of delight and appreciation it made me want to cry.

These are the moments.  Just fifteen minutes in the strawberry patch.  This life is so fast-paced, but our backyard slows me down a bit.  You can't harvest the strawberries quickly.  You crouch and cower and rustle through leaves and pick and evaluate.  Spending slow time in the backyard with the kids allows for moments like these -- spent picking little treasures out of the strawberry patch.

Life Cycle of the Backyard Strawberry

Our strawberries are super-productive right now.  Here are the ones I carried inside yesterday.  I took in just as many today.  They just don't stop!

So that you can get an idea of how big a strawberry patch will give you this many berries, here's a photo of our patch.  If you're familiar with our backyard, it runs along the West side of the shed that sits in the middle of our backyard.  It's probably about 12 feet long.  I ordered the plants about 4 years ago as a little pack of slips.  This patch has developed from what was originally 15-20 small, spindly sprouts.

As I harvest, I throw the "good" berries into my basket and the "bad" berries out onto the grass.  When I'm finished, I go back and gather up the bad berries in another container.  The berries on the left are the ones that go inside.  The ones on the right are the ones that have bruises or that pests have beaten us to.  Oh, the joys of organic gardening.  It's hard to complain, though, when you're eating 2 quarts of fresh strawberries a day.

Not to worry, though, those beaten up berries don't go to waste.  The chickens, it seems, aren't nearly as picky about their berries as we are.  And berries are some of their very favorite foods.  The chicken poo is "harvested" once a week and added to the compost pile, where it will turn into black gold -- an amazing fertilizer.  Eventually, it will be added back to the soil around the strawberry plants, fueling future berries.

Even if you don't have chickens, you can still grow strawberries from strawberries, like we do.  Just skip the chicken step and add the battered berries (and all your other fruit and veggie scraps) directly  to the compost pile. 

And, some of those lucky berries that make it inside get to go into my very most favorite food in all the world --  a backyard berry pie.  Our berries make a great strawberry pie because they're a bit more tart than, say, Bald Knob berries.  The sweet/tartness of the berries combined with the sugary pie filling is just DIVINE. 

This genuine smile came at the end of a very long day.  John and I were exhausted and had just gotten all the kids down to bed after traveling home from an away softball game.  I'd completely forgotten about the pie I'd made that afternoon . . . until I opened up the refrigerator.  John and I then pigged out on pie as our long, busy day faded into the background.  It was a nice moment.

Beer for the Berries

Well, the strawberries could no longer be kept a secret -- they've become much too prolific for that.  This is about 1/3 of what I brought in from the yard this morning.

Unfortunately, the slimy critters (snails and slugs) are in-the-know as well.  It was time to set my slug traps.  So, I called the only person in the world I know who wouldn't bat an eye at my calling to ask for a beer before 7:00am -- my father-in-law.  His only question for me was, "Is one enough, or do you need more?"  I love that man!  (Now that our county is "wet," I guess I could've just purchased some for myself.  But, I thought better of swinging through the gas station to pick up a cold 6-pack after I'd dropped the kids off at school.  It's a small town, you know.)

This year, I opted for smaller plastic tubs.  These are little whipped butter containers that are probably only 4 inches in diameter and about 3 inches deep.  I cut out a couple of notches around the top edge, dug them  little holes to set in (so that the cut-out notches are about ground-level), added about an inch of beer, and placed the lids on.

If they work as well as last year, I'll have several critters floating in there by morning.  Last year, I used sour-cream-sized containers, and they worked fine.  I think I'll prefer these smaller ones, though, because they hide better amidst the plants (you can barely even see the one pictured above) and it takes less beer to fill them an inch deep, leaving more leftover for you to either consume in celebration of your imminent victory over the snails or save to refill your traps when you need them again. :)

A Super-Speedy Video Garden Update

Happy Saturday!

A Loopy Idea for the Garden

In lieu of tomato cages, which can get pricey when you've got lots of plants (not to mention bulky to store in the off-season), I've been using simple garden stakes to support my plants.  Last year, I used knee high pantyhose cut into strips to secure the plants to the stakes.  This worked great:  the stockings were stretchy enough to allow the plants some wiggle room and didn't damage or cut into the tender stalks.  I needed tons of them, though, and they got a bit pricey.  This year, I decided to make use of craft loops instead.  In case you're unfamiliar, craft loops are more than likely what was used to create that priceless potholder you've got in the drawer.  You know, the one your little one made for you years ago and presented to you with such pride in her eyes you know you'll never forget it?  I am definitely not suggesting that you dismantle your memories for use in the garden.  Rather, go pick you up a box of loops from the craft section of the store.  My box contains well over 200 loops and was priced at just under $5.  To use, I just cut the loop to create a string and tie loosely around my plant and stake.  It does the trick!  Just remember to remove the ties before moving your past-their-prime plants to the compost pile in the fall.  I know from experience that they do not break down in the compost pile.  ;)

Shhh! Strawberry Secrets

I remember vividly one of the times I got into "big trouble" as a child.  Mom had made some sliced strawberries in syrup and had them in the refrigerator.  They were delicious!  They were so delicious, that even though I knew we weren't supposed to have food in our bedrooms, I snuck them out of the fridge and into my room to help myself to a little snack.  I walked over near the window and gave the little container a shake to be sure they were good and mixed up before I dove in.  Apparently, the lid wasn't on well and I shook syrupy strawberries all over my white-floral-patterned curtains.  Mom was, shall we say, unhappy.

Apparently I learned nothing major from the incident, though.  Here I am, nearly, umm, lots of year later, and I'm still eating strawberries in secret. 

Last week's Bald Knob berries are now a thing of the past, and the kids know that our backyard berries are "just about ready."  What they don't know is that if you lift up the leaves and look deep inside, some berries are already ripe. 

Please don't fault me for keeping it a secret.  My kids are just as bad as the birds -- once they discover those ripe berries, I can't keep them away.  The berries rarely even make it in the house -- the kids just help themself to a snack whenever they're outside playing.  I don't really mind; I'm glad they're eating something so good for them.

Soon enough, there'll be berries a plenty, but for now, I'm kind of enjoying my little secret snack.  :)

Scarecrow Sprinkler Install

As you may recall from a previous post, we've developed quite the cat problem around here.  To keep the kitties out of the garden, I ordered and today installed a ScareCrow sprinkler.    Here's a video of how it works.

I really wish I could've captured Scarf's first run-in with the sprinkler.  She's been up a tree ever since.  :)  Here's hoping this will help keep the gals out of my garden beds long enough for my seedlings to have a fighting chance.

Oh, and for the record, it took John far less than 30 minutes to save the day with my computer.  He's so nice to have around.  :)

A Year of Gardening in Four Minutes

I love this video.

It makes it look so doable.  Enjoy!

Cat Problem!

Around here, nearly everyone and everything contributes.  We've got several loop systems in place.  For example, let's begin with the goats.  The goats produce milk.  The milk feeds the cats.  The cats hunt mice.  The mice eat the grain in the shed.  The grain in the shed feeds the goats.  So, both the cats and the goats are contributors (I'm not convinced the mice are good for much). 

The darn cats, however, are stepping out of line and causing a real problem in my garden.  They seem to think that the nice, loose soil is there just for them to roll around in, and, worse, poop in.

Here you can see how the poor little bean sprouts are struggling to survive despite recent digging.

Feces! 

My research has turned up several potential solutions.  Lots of them are a lot of work for questionable payoff.  Some of them are not organic.  Some of them are downright toxic.  One organic solution (which I confess I've used in the past when the kitties in question did not belong to us) is to put out black pepper and/or ground mustard.  This burns kitty's paws and will really do a number on her bowels when she licks it off those burning paws.  So, this is out of the question.

Another potential solution is to plant flowers that deter cats.  Marigolds and geraniums, for example, are repulsive to cats.  I've allotted lots of squares in my square-foot-garden for flowers, so I'll plan to use some marigolds and geraniums in those spots.  These flowers also attract beneficial insects to the garden -- an added plus.

Finally, I plan to deploy the big guns and purchase one of these motion-activated sprinklers.  This one from Amazon has great reviews, qualifies for free shipping with Amazon Prime, and is priced at under $50.  That may sound like a lot of money, but if it takes care of the problem, it'll be well worth it.  Those of you who have problems with deer, birds, or other pests, may want to look into the sprinkler as a potential solution, too.  I'll let you know how it works with Scarf and Milkshake.  :)

Does anyone have any other suggestions for solving our little kitty problem?

Mulch!

What a beautiful day to haul and put out mulch with the help of a beautiful girl!

Don't you just love exercise that yields immediate results?   (Just one of the many reasons I love working in the yard!)