Gourd Happy... or my dad has a green thumb or... whatever Lola wants Lola gets!

What did I mean by the title... I couldn't decide what to call this installment. Here's what happened last spring. My mother (Lola) asked my dad to plant some gourds in his yearly garden. Since my mom is his muse he didn't just plant a gourd plant he planted about 30 feet by 10 feet of his garden in different types of gourds.



My mom has the idea that she's going to decorate gourds. My dad seems to think she won't do anything with them. Quite frankly I didn't really think so either, but I'm not going to squash her dreams with negativity. So, with a craft happy daughter dad should know that they'll get used. If mom doesn't do any by herself she'll for sure get to decorating gourds with me.

We read a book about how to dry them out and gourd growers in this book said they like to just leave them outside to dry. My dad covered them with plastic and for the most part they were drying, but some were rotting. I convinced him to try method number two that was told to me in person by a gourd grower. They said to dry them in wire baskets in garage. So, the kids and I picked 2 wagon barrels full and ran them up to the garage. My dad was helping to clear some room. Then the 2 large dog crates became our only barrier. Suddenly, dad and I had the same idea... since the dog crates weren't being used fill them up with gourds. The crates don't have to be moved and the gourds are encased in an airy environment for further drying.



Here's crossing our fingers that we'll have a lot of gourds to decorate!