The Vineyard Grows

Our vineyard last year was beautiful.

We’d planted 13 new kiwi plants and mulched all 5 rows. As I stood back and looked at our work, I felt a sense of accomplishment and could hardly wait to see it grow.

Last Year

Now, a year later, the same vineyard is beautiful, stronger and more resilient than last year. It needs less care because the roots are more developed and can do a lot on their own.

This Year

I still go out and check the plants. I make sure that they have what they need. I make sure that nothing is harming them. I take pictures of their growth and get excited seeing the fruits of our labor.

But they don’t need me as much.

Every year, they will continue to grow stronger and become more independent. Then, one day, I’ll walk through the rows and marvel at how something so small and vulnerable could have grown into something so beautiful and strong.

The vineyard was sparse
The boys were so much smaller
Time changes all things

Last Year

This Year

Posted 6/22/14
We’d always planned to expand the vineyard. Earlier this season, we planted a few more grapes and a few more hops. We were going to wait until next year to add more. That is, until we found the deal.

Ray’s mom called us and told us that Ace Hardware was having a 50% off sale on all plants and trees…she wanted to get us a tree for our tenth anniversary. We were on our way to drop the boys off before heading to Alaska, but we had a few hours yet, and went to take a peek.

There were a TON of plants, herbs and trees to choose from. The trees were much larger than those that we planted earlier in the year. We looked at the trees but couldn’t decide which one to get, so we started to walk around and see what kind of bushes and shrubs were on sale.

Then, I found them. The arguta kiwi. These are small grape sized fruit that are cold hardy and taste like kiwis.

“You are not going to believe this!”

“What did you find?” Ray asked walking my way.

There were so many plants! They were bigger and cheaper than the ones we bought from the nursery: half off of $16.

“Eight bucks, Ray. EIGHT BUCKS!”

The male we planted the previous year was growing really slow. We needed both male and female plants for pollination, so we ended up getting three new males ten new females. We added two rows to the vineyard and filled in the row we planted last year with a couple of ladies.. Then, we had 9 yards of mulch delivered to retain moisture.

We spent our Saturday planting and spreading mulch.

The boys also seemed to think it was pretty cool.

As we stood back and admired our work, I imagined the hops growing up the trellis and the grapes and the kiwi vining out and filling in all the empty spaces.

I couldn’t help but think how beautiful it was and imagine how gorgeous it would be in the future.

A beautiful place
A shady spot to relax
A place to enjoy