7 March, 0900 to 1600 (Open House schedule—drop by whenever)

Jon has been home for over 2 weeks now and we are going through the process of adjusting to living together as a family again. We have a big project coming up on Saturday, March 7, and if you'd like to come and help us, you can spend some quality time with Jon digging in the dirt. :) If not, I'm sure we'll schedule a more party-like Open House in the not too distant future. Read on to find out about our Landspacing Open House. I know we aren't updating the blog much these days, but you can find us on facebook, if you want to see pictures and learn other interesting facts about each of us. Sheryl

Sheryl, Joshua and I are finally getting around to adding some ground cover and foliage to our plot following the installation of our new prefabricated home back in January, 2008 (OK, we have some excuse for not doing this earlier, since I deployed two weeks after our house went in, and will have only been back about four weeks when we do this).

Our landscaping consultant is from Back to Natives Restoration, a non-profit that is focused on biodiversity and native plant landscaping benefits (to reduce water use, chemical herbicide and pesticide use--if not eliminate chemical use altogether). Our consultant will be conducting a “Do it Yourself” workshop to kick our day off, where we’ll learn about some of the benefits of restoring to California its native plants--while we immediately reinforce this learning with practical application.

Though these plants are hardy and drought tolerant, special treatment needs to be given during the planting portion to ensure a healthy acclimation process for the plants as they transition from a well watered container to our drought tolerant landscape! This process is noticeably different from the techniques taught at commercial nursery workshops or at the 'Do It Yourself Workshop' at your local big box home improvement store.

We’ll have the mulch and plants on hand, and would like our consultant to oversee our planting, but there is an hourly fee, so we’re looking for a few folks who might be interested in learning about native plant restoration as well as learning how to plant and care for them to help speed up the planting process. For more information regarding Back to Natives Restoration, you can visit their website at http://www.backtonatives.org

If you are willing to come help us, would you please drop us a note or give us a call? We'd like to plan to have adequate stuff on hand for breakfast, lunch, and/or artificial motivation and stimulants.

Jon