Late March 2024 Garden Updates

We started this garden for practically nothing (only the price of seeds and one bag of dirt). The cups have been working out so wonderfully. I jst wanted to keep track of our garden as it grows…I shared a photo of the dirt I am loving lately, below.

Cave City Yellow Watermelon Planted 2/28/24, pic from 3/21/24. We saved seeds from famous melons last year.

Below, you will see how incredibly fast the green beans are growing! WOW.

Garden Green Beans, planted 3/8/24, pic from 3/17/24.

Garden Green Beans, pic from 3/21/24

DIll and Sugar Daddy Peas, planted 3/8/24, pic from 3/21/24.

Sugar Daddy Peas, planted 3/8/24, pic from 3/21/24.

Velvet Queen Sunflowers, planted 3/8/24, pic from 3/21/24.

Brandywine Tomatoes and “Tomato Mix”. Our sandy soil here in Arkansas will be perfect for them. Planted 3/8/24, pic from 3/21/24 - these took a while to show but I am sure they’re going to be great.

My fave view right now… :) I am going to put together a tutorial of how we started our little seeds soon.

Organic Sugar Daddy Peas - transplanted into a 5 gallon bucket on 3/20/24. Just realizing we may need two 5 gal buckets total for the amount of these pease we actually started.

Autumn Sunflower - planted 3/8/24 - pic from 3/21/24.

Lastly, our awesome Cave City Yellow Watermelons again, which we are most proud of, planted on 2/23/24 (pic from 3/21/24). Last year, we bought one yellow and one red Cave City Watermelon, and saved the seeds very carefully. Well that was a great idea, because soon watermelon vines will be trailing ALL over our fence!

Shawnee Cave Revival - June 7-9, 2024

Yesterday, our tickets went live and on sale for our next festival, Shawnee Cave Revival! I am most excited for Greensky Bluegrass too - I remember seeing them back in Carbondale, IL at Tres Hombres when only 30 folks attended and NOW, look at them - headlining HUGE festivals and selling out large venues.

I created all the artwork for the festival, which I am so very proud of. Abive is the 18x24 poster and below is our schedule!

Below, you can check out all the Artist Frames I created using the same style as the poster. I am thrilled with this and all the bands approved them right away. So happy to be an integral part of this amazing place.

Additionally, I am in charge of working with Etix to re-design our new website, www.shawneecave.fun. Etix Rockhouse did such a fantastic job of making our venue shine. Below, is a photo of Travis and I last June at the Shawnee Cave Weekend At The Cave Festival 2023. We had the best weekend EVER.

Here is a photo of the venue at night. They have such high quality sound and light production, and I am happy to say this is somewhere we can be proud to help grow and flourish!!! If you want to learn more about the venue, please visit our website for details on Shawnee Cave Revival (June 7-9, 2024) and our incredible Shawnee Cave Total Solar Eclipse Festival (April 5-8, 2024), visit our website here, the Shawnee Cave Instagram page and Facebook page here!

Plus, they are now offering event rentals and wedding venue rentals, so stay tuned as that progresses!

Easy St. Patrick's Day Treats - Lucky Charms Pops

Want a fun and easy treat for St. Patty’s Day? Look no further! With just a few supplies you can make these pops in less than 20 minutes. By using these molds found on Amazon, I was able to easily craft the cutest holiday treats in minutes flat. The molds worked incredibly well and the chocolate came right out, easily.

INGREDIENTS:

  • Marshmallows separated from Lucky Charms

  • White chocolate bark or Ghirardelli White Chocolate

  • Sprinkles

  • Pop Mold with Sticks

INSTRUCTIONS:

  1. Insert pop sticks into molds (find molds here which came with the sticks). Tape the sticks into the molds, like shown below. Separate marshmallows from Lucky Charm’s Cereal and set aside. I needed 2 marshmallows per pop. Set pop molds onto baking sheet so you can move it around easily.

  2. Melt white chocolate bark until smooth. Spoon into each circle cavity in the mold and fill just covering the sticks. Tap mold on counter lightly until chocolate smooths out and no air bubbles remain. The sticks should be covered.

  3. Add 2 marshmallows to each pop then add a few sprinkles to each one.

  4. Let cool on countertop or in fridge for 20 minutes and then remove tap from molds and remove pops from molds carefully. These ones were so nice to work with, and very good quality.

  5. Individually wrap each pop in a cute treat bag or store in the fridge in an air-tight container. Enjoy!

These were so easy to complete and I definitely plan on making more cereal themed pops soon! Stay tuned for more ideas along the way!

Garden Progress + DIY Palette Garden Bed - Mid March 2024

We are in year tow of our garden here in central Arkansas, zones 7a-8b,. Last year, we started some of our garden via seed, but we started all seeds outdoors. We built our amazing DIY palette garden beds (one of which we rebuilt this year), and cannot wait to plant our little seedlings in our new garden beds once they are a bit stronger.

HERE’S WHAT WE PLANTED ON MARCH 8, 2024

Notes from the garden: 2/25 and 2/28/2024

Planted basil seeds from our garden then planted organic basil seeds from store. Also planted Cave City Yellow Watermelon (one cup grew wonderful and one did not grow at all).

3/8/2024

Planted seeds of the following: Sunflowers, Bell Peppers, Cilantro, Dill, tomatoes, peas.

3/14/2024

Seeing growth on the following: Peppers, sunflowers, and peas, cilantro.

Below, you can see some of my most cherished seedlings! Last year we went on a fun adventure near Cave City, AR. The watermelons from that city are famous so we decided to wash/dry/preserve some of those seeds from last summer. We saved both yellow watermelon, shown below, and I just started some of the red Cave City watermelons a few days ago, and I am already seeing growth on them!

Above, Cave City Watermelon Seedlings after one week, and below, after two weeks and transplanted into a larger pot.

Below, you will see one misfortune in the seedling game we are playing. Before I thought to use my plastic cups for seedlings,we purchased two type of Spinach seeds online and the Giant Noble spinach seeds from a farm in Columbus, OH barely had any growth since 2/28/24, and the American Spinach seeds I ordered elsewhere has shown less than half germination. So, perhaps it was the seeds, but maybe I over watered, or something? So, I will try these same sets of seeds in my clear plastic cups and let you all know if it is the tray or what. You never know what you are going to get!

I am wondering if it is honestly these trays or what, because most everything else I started in my cups, has been germinating within 5-7 days! Below, you can see a cup I planted our Sugar Daddy Peas in on 3/8/24 and wow they are taking OFF!

DIY Palette Garden Bed Instructions:

Materials Needed:

4 Palettes, 2 1/2” wood screws, drill, saw.

Tools We Use:

Instructions:

We cut/sawed apart a total of 4 palettes length wise, and used them to create the four sides. We used 2 1/2” wood screws to attach all the sides together. Next, we used smaller boards which were still attached to the extra pallet pieces as sides, in lieu of using weed barrier fabric like we did last year on the blue bed.

After you have reinforced the sides and made sure there is nowhere for dirst to fall out, then fill the bed with as many sticks as you can. This helps us save because we use less bags of dirt

Lastly, fill the remaining space in with bags of dirt. We like using the Miracle Grow soil if we can!

Once our seedlings are strong enough and there is no more cold weather snaps forecasted, our seedlings wil be plated outside in these beds, in an efort to have an even bigger and more varied garden than year one, last year!

I wish I had known about these exact DEWAT Tools being on sale but I provided some links to the deals below for our handheld saw and our amazing cordless handheld drill from DEWALT. They have lasted a long time.

BELOW, OUR GARDEN FROM LAST YEAR (2023)

We got tons of tomatoes and tons of basil (which grew nestled beneath all of our tomatoes, shown here.

Below, out first palette garden bed built last year, then the awesome GardenWerx bag and gardening tools Travis got me as a surprise last year. I could not find a link for them, but I included a few cute ideas below.

Can’t wait to see how the garden performs this season!

Falling Water Falls (Waterfall) - Sandgap, AR - Richland Creek Wilderness Area

Hello! I’m back from a little blogging hiatus to share with you a stunning waterfall we visited in Northwestern(ish) Arkansas called Falling Water Falls. Located in Sandgap, Arkansas, in the Richland Creek Wilderness area, this waterfall is well worth the drive. There are other beautiful waterfalls along this drive too, which we will cover in upcoming posts.

The best part, this one is actually roadside. You park very close to the waterfall, and within a few steps, you are met with a majestic, blue rushing waterfall that looks like one of the best swimming holes ever.

The Explore The Ozarks website had some great information about this place, found here.

WATERFALL INFORMATION:

  • Height: 10'

  • GPS: N35 43.317, W 92 56.964

  • USGS Quad: Smyrna

  • Distance: View from road

  • Difficulty: Easy

  • Location: Ozark National Forest

  • Ranger District: Big Piney

  • Region: Arkansas Ozarks & Boston Mountains

DETAILS & DIRECTIONS:

This beautiful little waterfall is conveniently located right next to the road, so you don't even have to get out of your car to see it! Falling Water Falls is located on, of course, Falling Water Creek, just a few miles east of Ben Hur, on Falling Water Road/FR# 1205. There is also a nice big pool that the falls spill into, and it is a popular swimming hole in the summer. This waterfall is located just south of the Richland Creek Wilderness Area, which also has numerous other beautiful waterfalls, well worth a day of exploring.

To get to Falling Water Falls, travel East on AR Hwy 16 from Pelsor/Sand Gap, which is located on Scenic Hwy 7 between Russellville and Jasper. Travel about 9 miles on AR Hwy 16 (past Pedestal Rocks/Kings Bluff) to the community of Ben Hur. About a mile east/south of Ben Hur, Turn Left onto FR# 1205/CR# 68/Upper Falling Water Road. Falling Water Falls will be 2.3 miles north on this road, and there will an area to pull off on the side of the road, right next to the falls.

To get to Falling Water Falls from the Richland Creek Campground, travel about 7 miles South on FR# 1205, and you will come to the falls on your left.

Falling Water Falls - Upper Falling Water Rd -

Sand Gap, AR 72856

 

After moving from Illinois to Arkansas last year, Travis and I are REALLY enjoying the mountains and creeks and hiking opportunities here in the Natural State.

We could imagine having a picnic or fun swimming day here soon.

Just steps from the road, you can step out onto the top of the waterfall and explore the area. Such a stunning view!

Below are a couple of cute Hiking-Inspired finds you may enjoy too. Having good boots and cute socks make a world of difference when adventuring like we do.

While we were just here for a little bit, we are definitely going back this spring, and we are really looking forward to it.

Until next time!! - Love, Katherine, Travis, Porter, and Luna