Catching up on blogging with some rapid sequence posting! It’s gardening season again! Last year I mentioned that I obtained alpaca poop from a cardiologist colleague who also happens to own and live on an alpaca farm. He is just one of the nicest people I know, to boot. This year I went back for more and brought the kids with me. Just look at that face! On the farm they have alpaca, llama, and paco-vicuña, all used for their wool. They sell the fibers out of the farm and at various fiber festivals across the country.  Paco-vicuña in particular creates a lusciously soft fiber. The kids had fun getting to know the animals Well, the girl did.  The boy, hilariously, was TERRIFIED of the curious but skittish creatures.   That didn’t stop him from standing on the sidelines, shouting out instructions to the other kids and telling them the right way to interact with the animals, even though he rarely got within spitting distance of one again. There’s the girl, helping to shovel some of the steaming pile of…poop. And once we got home, more shoveling. Thankfully I had some dedicated helpers. Pictured with the boy is one of his neighbor friends from down the street. He and his brother always run up and help us whenever there’s any gardening to be done, and are actually very good and helpful! Given that this post is a month old, most of the garden is done and planted at this point-will take pictures of that when it’s had a chance to grow a bit. Differences from last year so far–I’m not bothering with corn or any bell peppers.  I like the look of corn but it had too many creatures last year and not enough yield.  As for the bell peppers, I can’t get them to grow even remotely well.  I’m doing more beans this year and hoping to have some dried ones for winter, and I’m trying brussels sprouts for the first time. The boy also said he wanted his own plot so I’ve given him one of the boxes by the street-he thus far chose a broccoli plant, a green zebra tomato, a brussels sprout, and some flowers.  He’s responsible for the weeding and learning about the care of the plants, which will be a great summer project for him, I think.