What Was Your First Tweet on Twitter?

While I'm not as active on Twitter as I was, I still show up there on occasion as @OurLittleAcre.  I've had a sort of on again, off again kind of love affair with it, but for some it's the social media tool of choice.  I'm a big fan of Facebook because it's so much easier to follow, but yes, I know...they aren't the same and each has its place in the social media world.

It's kind of like cats and dogs.  One really isn't better than another, just different. Both make wonderful pets, but some people have a clear preference for one or the other.  Some like both equally and some couldn't care less about either one.  Like social media, we tend to gravitate towards that which is easier for us and fits with our lifestyle.  It's all good.

From shoeboxblog.com

Twitter is celebrating eight years this year and they've got a feature which allows you to see what your very first tweet was.  I certainly didn't remember how I utilized my 140 characters the first time, but Twitter tells me it was this:

How appropriate.  :-)

Want to find out when you joined Twitter?  It might not be the same time as your first tweet.  Some people like to join and observe for a bit before jumping in.  In case you don't remember, find out when you joined here.  This will also show you some other fun stats about your Twitter account.  Here are mine:

Twitter is the home of #gardenchat, #treechat, #herbchat, #rosechat, and other specialized chats where time is set aside each week for interested tweeters to come together to discuss topics relating to their passions.  But gardeners can get some pretty quick answers to questions they might have by tweeting them at any time of the day or night. Never before has information and discussion about everything under the sun been so easily accessible.

So...what is your favorite social media mode?  Facebook?  Twitter? Google+? LinkedIn? Pinterest?  Instagram? FourSquare? YouTube?  Do you use any of them to find information on gardening?

"Our Little Acre" - The Story Behind the Name

Monica Milla (Garden Faerie's Musings) and Brenda Haas (BGgarden) were having a Twitter discussion one day, talking about how their blogs got their names. I knew how Bren's had gotten hers, but Monica's story was new to me. They decided to ask other bloggers to share their stories of how their blogs got their names. Here's mine:

August 2004

Since 1977, we have lived in rural northwest Ohio on a small plot of land. We've always had a vegetable garden, but it was only since 2005 that I got involved with gardening in a big way, and started growing ornamental plants, too. Lots of them. As my passion for growing deepened, our older daughter Kara recognized that I needed a way to share what was happening in our gardens. She suggested I start a blog.

I gave it some thought and decided to just do it. Younger daughter Jenna had this idea that I sat around all day eating bonbons and watching soap operas on the days I didn't work as a dental hygienist. (I had cut back dramatically on my work schedule to just half a day a week.)

June 2008

Sometimes I wrote it as a story, and sometimes in journal form. Initially, it was started just to share things with family and maybe some friends. But soon there were comments from people I didn't know. I had a Julie and Julia moment. ("People are actually reading what I wrote!")

That was almost five years ago now; my first post was published on January 2, 2007. Much has happened in those years - so many wonderful friendships formed and opportunities presented. Writing Our Little Acre has changed my life in ways that I could never have imagined and I'm grateful for Kara's suggestion. I used to hate writing (seriously!) and now I have to write, much as a runner just has to run.

Oh...the name? We live on an acre, of course.

To read The Story Behind the Name of other bloggers, visit Monica's post at Garden Faerie's Musings.

#gardenchat Welcomes Year-Round Growers

Those of us who live in the north get to take a break from the hustle and bustle of spring, summer, and fall growing in the garden. Winter affords us time to circle the wagons and plan for the next year. But we do miss our green...

Conservatories and greenhouses make it possible to grow year round, and this coming Monday, November 14th, #gardenchat on Twitter will feature some gardeners who do just that. Brenda Haas manages and is the moderator of the hour-long forum for those interested in all things gardening and just happens to be one of those who grows year round in her greenhouse. She (@BG_garden), along with Glenda Duchak (@Tootsie_Time), Brian Elgin (@brianelgin) , and I (@OurLittleAcre), will be sharing our experiences from 9:00 - 10:00 PM EST. Those who grow  houseplants in their homes will no doubt benefit from the chat as well.

To participate, simply pop onto Twitter and use the hashtag #gardenchat to be included in the conversation. It does move quickly, but Bren always posts a transcript following #gardenchat on the official site here. You'll also find detailed instructions on how to join in on the fun.

You can submit questions ahead of time by sending them to Bren, although it's not necessary. All you really need to do is show up.

Hope to see you on Monday night!

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Read about my conservatory: The Best Little Hort House

We Are Not Alone...

"The phenomenon reported is something real and not visionary or fictitious."

~General Nathan Twining

I just don't know. All this talk of aliens and stuff. I'm a believer that God created everything but I am also a firm believer that we cannot possibly ever discover everything that He created. I don't even think that's entirely necessary, and gee...we have to have something to always be on the quest for, right? We'd get bored if there wasn't.

My world is big and yet small, all at the same time. Heck, my garden alone is tiny in comparison to all there is in the world for me to discover, yet I'll never quite know or understand everything that goes on even in our little acre. Take something that's happening right this minute, for instance.

Let me back up a little bit...

A couple of weeks ago, I harvested some of the spinach that I planted early in September, or maybe it was late in August. I don't remember. But Romie told me it was good and since I never got to taste that first bit of it, and we were having some pretty nice fall weather, I decided to try planting another crop.

Looks good, doesn't it? Romie assured me it was.

I remember the winter of 2005-2006 and the spinach that never did die. We had green spinach that entire winter.  I'd just clear away the snow and there it was, crisp and fresh as ever. This time, I decided to order a frost cover from Gardener's Supply for extra protection and it came yesterday.

I took it out to the garden to cover the area where I planted the spinach, and that's when I saw "it."

The chain link fencing was laid over the planted area so the cats wouldn't dig in it.

Just what "it" was...well...that was up for debate and what better place to debate it than on Twitter. You can find out anything on Twitter. For real! Just type the question (in 140 characters or less) and let it fly. Someone will have the answer. It might not be the right one, but it sure will give you some food for thought.

So, I asked:

@ourlittleacre: WHAT on earth is this gel-like goop that formed over the rows of spinach seeds I planted?

And I immediately got responses:

@gardenfix: Hollandaise sauce?
@gabbygardener: creepy...
@MulchMaven: gel-like goop on spinach seeds? Sounds like a Wednesday post to me! ;-)
@CB4wildlife: my only thought is Praying Mantis. I watched one lay its eggs today, but that is more "foam like".  That is NOT praying mantis, that's for sure LOL
@marykir: do you use that water absorbing gel? I get stuff like that in my boxes when it rains a lot. Usually not so opaque though.

No.


@gabbygardener: OK I am guessing, It may seed coat gel, with cooler weather is not breaking down and it is gathering at the soil surface.
@TheresaLoe: Perhaps a fungus?
@AboutInsects: Hmm. Looks to me like fruiting bodies of some kind of fungus, maybe a jelly fungus. What's it feel like? Quick to appear?


It feels like a gel, with a fair amount of body. It began appearing yesterday.


@gardenfix:  I think it might be slime mold. http://plantclinic.cornell.edu/FactSheets/slimemold/slimemold.htm Fact sheet says it grows pretty quickly under moist conditions.
@AboutInsects: I'm assuming you didn't use any water retention gel beads, or potting soil with moisture control, right?

Right.


@bwisegardening: I'm thinking alien invasion...

Hmmm...


@AboutInsects: This is kind of fun. Video from Scotland about trying to ID white jelly blobs on soil. http://bbc.in/bpC3Ow
@gardenfix: You're not alone in being puzzled. See this -- it's just like yours: http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/outdoors/articles/jelly/

Great minds think alike. (And use Google.)


@AboutInsects: Actually, look up "star jelly"

So, I did.

Star jelly (also called astromyxin, astral jelly, pwdr sêr, star rot, or star shot) is a gelatinous substance, which, according to folklore, is deposited on the earth during meteor showers. (Wikipedia)

@AboutInsects: Might try taking a sample to local extension office. May need a good microscope to confirm.


Somewhere around this point, the conversation started to deteriorate while at the same time making great progress, and the late night crew came to the conclusion that it was alien snot. Yep, sure looks like snot to me.

I was then urged to share this information with the rest of the internet. I mean, what if someone else has this in their garden and they need to know what it is, too? We've just saved them all that trouble of coming to the logical conclusion that highly trained tweeters took nearly an hour to figure out.

But @gardenfix, bless her heart, just wouldn't be satisfied and was still on the trail...

@gardenfix: Here's something that suggests it might be a jelly fungus: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ngawangchodron/257046365/

...and @herbgardens and @nwheat chimed in with votes for slime mold and fungus.@gabbygardener stuck with her original theory of it being the natural seed coat congealing.

Alien snot got the most votes, so all day today, I was satisfied with the idea that I had alien snot in my garden. After all, we had some crop circles near here several years ago, so alien visits were nothing new. And surely it's organic, right? Perhaps it will be the perfect soil conditioner for the tough clay we have here. Maybe it's a super fertilizer and we'll have a bumper crop of spinach. In December. Or it could be that miracle ingredient that allows certain types of spinach to grow when there's snow! All thanks to aliens. Who knew?

But the story wasn't over. No sirree. I'd also posted a photo of it on my Our Little Acre Facebook page and it was there that my dreams of being visited by aliens and having them deposit precious bodily fluids on my garden like fairy dust were dashed.

My friend Joseph - Super Garden Brain College Student Joseph - shared some information:
 

@Joseph Tychonievich: Quoting from "The effect of excess moisture on the germination of Spinacia oleracea" by Walter Heydecker and P.I. Orphanos:

"...the fruit coat [of spinach] becomes mucilaginous within little more than an hour of contact with an excess of water"

It is actually pretty common for seeds to exude slime -- some basils, and almost all salvias do lots of it. It is variously theorized to prevent seeds from drying out, inhibit germination under excessively wet conditions, or keep things from eating the seeds.

Since the gel is in a line directly over where the seeds are planted, I would say this is exactly what is going on. @gabbygardener said this from the start. And while I find this to be very cool, although strange, I kind of liked it better when we believed it to be alien snot.

May the force be with us all.

Humble Thanks

Today, the winners of the Mouse and Trowel Awards for excellence in garden blogging were announced, after a nomination period, followed by voting.  I'm humbled that Our Little Acre was the recipient of several awards.  I just don't know what I could say to express my thanks and appreciation to so many that felt I deserved these honors.

The field of nominees represented a mere fraction of the wonderful and varied garden blogs out there.  I've seen the number of them absolutely explode in the three and a half years since I began writing about my garden adventures.  This is such a great thing! 

While there are certainly more talented writers and photographers than I, what is most important is that we all are writing about and photographing what we love - our gardens.  This sharing of information among those that have a passion for growing things helps novice and veteran gardeners alike. It helps us become better gardeners, and precious friendships are forged in the process.

I have been a dental hygienist for the life of my entire "career" - since 1977 - and only began gardening in 2005. If you would have told me five years ago that I would be nuts over flowers and the like, to the extent that I am, and that I'd get as much enjoyment in writing and photographing them as I do, I would not have believed a bit of it.

But life has a way of taking twists and turns, especially later in life, when you look at the  opportunities placed before you.  I'm fortunate that I have the freedom to focus on things that I truly love doing while still having one foot firmly planted in the career that I chose so long ago.  Fortunate, and blessed.

Again, thank you and congratulations to all the nominees and winners, and to the rest,  who are just as awesome.  We're all in this together.

The Power of Twitter

Social media is confusing to some. "What's Twitter all about?" I've been asked, and I find myself struggling to truly explain it.  It's a chat room, yet more.  It's a way to share information about things that interest you.  You can meet others that you may have things in common with.  But these definitions somehow seem inadequate - lacking in some way.

Today, perhaps one of the best things about Twitter was demonstrated through the community of those who tweet, in their unification by a fellow Tweeter's health crisis. Katie, a.k.a. @gardenpunk, is fighting for her life in a California hospital.  What she first assumed was the flu turned out to be bacterial meningitis.

Katie's situation is personal to me for a couple of reasons. It was in January 1999 that I fought and won my own battle back from the brink of death from this very same disease.  I was not expected to live, yet I did, and I credit the thousands of prayers that were said, along with some very good doctors doing their thing.  I tell you this to give hope that Katie can do it, too.

Secondly, I have met Katie in person.  She and her then husband, Chris, attended Spring Fling in Chicago last May.  She always warned me that she was my official stalker, because she was one of the very first followers of Our Little Acre and became a very loyal one.  After having met her and spending some time with her, I told her I was honored to have her "stalk" me.

Sometimes you just click with people. Sometimes you just don't.  There was no question with Katie.  We clicked.  It didn't matter that she was the same age as my older daughter; we were more like contemporaries. 

After Spring Fling, we began chatting on Twitter as I became more involved with it.  I'll admit that I wasn't all that impressed with it when I first signed up, but in time, as I used it more and more, I found some great gardeners and others with whom to connect.  It soon became part of my daily routine.

Earlier this week, Katie and I had a lengthy conversation (privately) about the turn her life had taken in recent months and she said she was as happy as she'd been in a long time.  She had taken charge of her life and was living it the way she was meant to.  I could feel her enthusiasm in the words she chose when she spoke.

But just two days later, on Thursday, I got a late night tweet from Carri, who happens to live near Katie and is a good friend of hers.  Katie had been taken to the ER and was in critical condition. It wasn't known at first what was making her so sick, but as Carri relayed available information to me, I told her it sounded eerily familiar to my experience with meningitis.  In the end, Katie was diagnosed with just that and it had progressed to septicemia, which I'd also experienced with my own meningitis.

Knowing how deadly the disease can be, I knew that Katie was going to need all the prayers she could get. Carri knew it too, and we talked about how we had each experienced the power of prayer in our own lives during our own past health crises.

In the past months, Katie has become a vibrant voice on Twitter, both in the gardening community as well as to others.  When word spread about her illness and fight for life, the Twitter community came together to pass on information about her condition and to express its concern for her.  Good thoughts and prayers began to flow in amazing numbers.

Tonight, Katie is still fighting and we're still praying.  Though there's little any of us can do, through the power of the internet and Twitter, we can comfort each other and provide hope and encouragement to her family and friends.  Her family is reading those messages to her and they're certain she can hear them.

Most of us have never met Katie in person, but that doesn't make her any less of a concern for us, as we feel we know her through her online voice, thanks to her willingness to share her life with us on Twitter and on her blog, gardenpunk.

Katie, we miss you and we love you.  We'll continue to pray for you and think positive thoughts.  We'll all be glad when you're back with us again. It's not the same without you.

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You can leave your own message for Katie and her family at her Caring Bridge page.

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