Save your back and a few seeds along the way

It's been a busy few weeks here.  Plans for the Farmer's Market are coming along quite nicely and I'm feeling like it's going to be pretty great.

In between phone calls and helping Hubby with his computer business and being a mom and.... , I've been making seed tapes.  You can find tutorials for how to do them everywhere these days.  What it comes down to is some kind of flimsy, easily broken down paper, glue of some kind and seeds.  I prefer tp, elmers and just about any tiny seed.

You see, I'm not the most patient gardener in the world and I have a bad back.  Given the choice of carefully planting seeds or scattering them everywhere, I'll invariably choose the scatter method.  The problem is that it wastes a ridiculous number of seeds. Then they have to be thinned and I'm not a big fan of thinning either.  It makes me sad to pull out a perfectly good seedling, plus it means I have to get down and pull them.  Seed tapes solve all those problems.  You can buy them pre made, but I'm also cheap and I like to have a lot of variety.

I'm doing beets today.  There will be 3 different varieties this Spring.  Chiogga, Cylindra and Detroit Dark Red are my choices this year.  The carrots have already been done, there are 3 varieties of those as well.  You can't find that at the seed store.  Seed tapes are good for lettuce, parsnips and really any small seed that gets planted in quantity.  I thought about cabbage and broccoli, but that just seemed a bit much.

When they dry, just roll them up and store them away until planting time.

It's been unseasonably cold this March, so nothing much has been happening in the garden.  I'm really hoping that it warms up a bit soon, there are far too many seedlings in the basement.  The cabbage, broccoli, chard, kale and asian greens are all ready to go out.  Since I have no desire to pot them up, I'm hoping it will warm up instead.

My happy place

Sometimes I just have to sit back and realize that it's all going to be just fine.  I have to go to that happy place.  The happy place changes from day to day and season to season.  Right now, it's the excitement of the coming gardening year. 

For all of us gardeners, the next garden is perfect.  The weather will be ideal, weeds will be minimal and timing will leave nothing to be desired.  The seeds will have excellent germination and I will of course document every little thing that happens, in order to keep a good record of the year.  In reality, of course, there will be weeds, crops will do poorly, there will be too little or too much rain, there will be weeds.  In short nothing will be perfect.  Except, it will be in many ways.  There will always be that one crop that did amazing.  There will be thing that keeps us all going. 

Seeds hold so much promise.  They hold the promise of joy and wonder.  These tiny little powerhouses will burst forth and amaze us yet again.

We will again be reminded of why we do something so crazy as growing our own food.  The more I see on the news about our food, the more I am glad that I am able to grow even a small portion of what we eat.  I can be a part of the history of our world, by growing and eating foods that have been nurtured for thousands of years. 

I know many who read my blog are gardeners.  Some are very experienced and I learn from them and some are new to this.  Every year it seems that there are more and more gardeners.  Some are here to be 'green', some because they want to save money, some are just doing it for the love of food.  Whatever your reason, the joy of seeds is a universal one of hope.  They don't have to be neatly cataloged, they don't need to be from the fancy garden catalogs, they just need to be.  Enjoy your seeds.  Dream of the perfect garden.

Mid July garden

The garden is in full swing now.  Usually I say that about 3 weeks or so from now, but I'm taking the early season and running with it!

The tomatoes are huge.  They needed extra support, so I wrapped jute around the outside of the supports to corral them in.  I'm still loving these A frame supports.

Isn't that the most beautiful thing you've ever seen?  I'm resisting picking this, as it is still just slightly under ripe.  Probably tomorrow.  It's extra exciting this year.  Hubby used to hate raw tomatoes, but after years of eating them by myself, I'll have someone to share the tomato goodness with.  Next year I have plans for cherry tomatoes since I won't be the only one eating them.

The corn is looking great.  The tassels are making the kids want it even more.  In a few more weeks we'll be eating lots of corn!

The lettuce has gone to seed.  I'm thinking that instead of saving seed this year, I'll just shake the seeds onto the ground.  This is in one of the hoop houses, so when it's ready it should come up on it's own.

Speaking of hoop houses, this is some chard that I just transplanted into one.  There is still lots to plant, but they're starting to take shape.  I'm off to the farm supply for straw today.  That should help to insulate them and reduce weeds as well.  Usually I'm a straw fanatic, but this year I didn't use much.  The last 2 years have been wet and cool and the straw has been more hindrance than help.  It figures that this year, when I don't use any, is the year I needed it the most.  Better late than never.

Seeds and things

Yes I realize that this is not a seed.  It's a chicken, a very noisy one at that.  She does however provide me with some rather tasty eggs, so I'll let her stay.  She has nothing whatsoever to do with the rest of the post, I just haven't had any pictures of the girls lately.

These, however, are spinach seeds.  I'm really in love with how things look when they're setting seed. 

If you click on the picture it will enlarge.  This is the parsnip going to seed.  I love the happy little bee with pollen all over her legs.  There haven't been too many lately, which is making me sad.  Last year I had tons, but so far this year, not too many.

I wish most Americans realized how beautiful veggies are when they are growing.  These potatoes look so boring on the shelf, but while growing put on an amazing show. 

Lastly, the strawberries.  I'm quite happy with the amount of berries on the plants for their first year.  If you look closely though, you'll see that something has taken a small bite out of one already.

First day of planting

What a gorgeous week we've had!  After flooding rains, we've been rewarded with May weather.  It's been in the 60's all week with 70's predicted for tomorrow.  Normal for us is upper 40's for this time of year.  It's just what the doctor ordered for my winter weary soul.

I took full advantage, now that my brood is back to health.  The Cascadia sugar snap peas were planted along the fence.  In the lettuce box I planted Winter Density lettuce and Winter mix lettuce with some Bright Lights swiss chard as well.  There will be salads galore. 

In one of my new beds, I planted Detroit Dark Red beets and Nantes carrots.

The carrots were seeded with this seed tape.  I tried making my own seed tapes last year with miserable results.  I wanted to try again with less work involved.  There is a discount store near me that sells these for 40% off, so I gave them a try.  They are certainly easy to work with.  If they work out, I'll make some up with toilet paper this year.  Last year I used napkins and seeds that were of questionable age, so it was my own fault that I had a failure.  

We'll be getting more rain early next week, so I won't have to water these in.  The soil is still quite damp, but not soggy.  It's amazing, I was actually feeling a bit blah until I went out and played in the dirt.  

The chickens are liking it too.

Seedling update

Things are getting a little crazy in here.  I went and got the plastic for my hoops, but was unable to get the right PVC piping to get them up today.  Hopefully, tomorrow, I'll be able to take Hubby's truck and get everything warming up. 

The lettuce is huge, as you can see.  The onions are ok, but I think I've lost a few.  I've never had good luck with onions.  They start out well and then I end up with them damping off, despite doing as much as possible to prevent it.  I can't plant them for a while yet, so I'll have to continue to baby them inside.

These are the brassicas and a few flowers in the background.  The plan is to erect the hoops and warm the soil, then plant them out in about 3 weeks.  We'll see how that goes.  The weather has warmed nicely and doesn't look like it will be cooling down too much in the foreseeable future.  Even the weatherman said that he thought that the worst was over.  Since we haven't had much in the way of spring here in New England for the past few years, it would be very welcome.  Yes, Kiwi, we do have spring every once in a while. 

I had a picture of my peppers, but they seem to have disappeared.  They are coming up slowly, as is expected.  The first came up within a week, but the rest are popping up here and there.  They are certainly doing better upstairs than they have in the basement. 

The chickens wanted to say hello again as well.  How are your seedlings doing these days?  Have you started anything yet?

And the winner is.....

Kit!  Congratulations Kit.  I wish I had more sets to give away.  Enjoy your seeds.

Survival seeds giveaway

Welcome to my first giveaway!  Today I will be giving away seeds from Hometown seeds.  They are offering a pack of Survival Seeds for a reader.  Please check out all the great items that they have to offer. 

This pack contains seeds for a complete garden.  They are all sealed up for you and will keep for 5 years without any work from you.  If you put them in the freezer, they'll keep for at least 10.  This pack contains many of the same seeds that I use every year.  They are all open pollinated, non GMO seeds.  Some of my favorites are Detroit Dark Red beets, Waltham Butternut squash and Black Beauty zucchini.  All of them are proven winners in the garden and will feed your family quite well. 

 

I know lots of us have the box of seeds.  If they are like mine, they are loosely organized and have way too many.  The beauty of this package, is that you will have enough of the right seeds if there were ever an issue and you couldn't get seeds for yourself.  I'm learning to save seeds, myself to prevent any issues in the future.  Many are easy to save, but there are quite a few that are difficult.  

To enter, please go to Hometown Seeds and see what they have to offer.  Then leave me a comment telling me if there are any seeds in the pack that you've planted before, or are interested in.  I'll draw the winner on Friday.  The Survival Seeds packet will be mailed directly from Hometown seeds.  Make sure that in your comment you give me an email address, or link to somewhere that I can contact you. 

Better than candy

 

Ok, so I've said before that I have a bit of a seed/gardening supply habit.  It has now passed onto the kids.  These things happen.  I should have known that if I used these things in front of my kids, that they would think it was ok and start experimenting themselves.  They've branched out into flowers more than I usually do though.  They want to attract the bee crowd and possibly set up a hive.  They keep begging every time we pass a seed display.  The other day they decided that it would be cool to look at all my garden porn.  I guess I didn't hide it well enough. 

Seriously though, do you see that electronic soil tester?  It gives readings for ph and organic matter.  How cool is that?  I had seen one before on another blog, and now I have my own!  I had to get some new gloves as well.  I'm hoping that the red color will stand out better, so that when I set them down, I can find them.  

I now have everything that I need to start my gardening year off.  We got the lights for my new seed starting shelves, soil, containers and seeds.  I'm sure that I'll be tempted into buying other things along the way, but for now, I'm good.  Off to start some onion seeds!

Lights and More Seeds

Ah, yes, J comes through again.  He built me these fabulous shelves for my seed starting.  There are 3 levels each about 20x30.  The shelves stack, so that I can move them relatively easily.  They are each electrified separately as well.  I can't believe how much space I now have to start my babies!    For the past few years I've been using 2 elevated grow lights, each about 30 inches long.  You should have seen the tin foil contraptions I made to try to grow more seedlings under my very small light space.  These will now be my back ups.  If I run out of space here, those will be put into use.  Since I had J put 2 lights on each shelf, everything will get plenty of light.

As you can see they are in my school room.  This is wonderful for a few reasons.  It is right off my kitchen, which is where I do all my seed sowing.  It is also right off my deck, which is where I do all my hardening off.  The room is full of windows as well, so that should help to further supplement the light for the seedlings.  It is warmer than the basement by a good 10 degrees as well.  Finally there is a good amount of traffic here, so the movement should be good for toughening up those baby plants.  It is certainly not what one expects to see in a school room, but it works for me and that is all that matters.  My house will never make it into House Beautiful.  (is that still a magazine?) 

I also received my seed order from Pinetree, which is actually the bulk of my order this year.  I'm a little sad, because my Cascadia peas were out of stock.  Hopefully they'll be here before March, so that I can get them into the ground.  I may be scrambling for a replacement though.  The last order to arrive will be Fedco.   My onion seeds are in that one.  Those will be the first things to be sown, as soon as they get here.

I'm in the process of a major reorganization project in the house right now.   I'm trying to get that finished in the next week, so that I can concentrate on the spring projects later.  I'll post pictures of what I'm doing when it's finished.  My friend S and I had a lovely field trip to Ikea for the project.  She is a wonderful help with all things shopping and organizing.  For those of us who are shopping phobic, it's nice to have some help sometimes. 

The First Seeds Arrive

Baker Creek was quite speedy this year.  These wonderful seeds arrived on Saturday.  As usual, they sent along a free pack of seeds, this year it was Mizuna.  It was awfully thoughtful of them to realize that it would fit nicely in my garden this year!  Many of these seeds will go to friends.  Beans and spinach to K and J.  Cukes to K. 

You may notice that there is a very silly little girl trying to get in the picture above.  I thought she needed her own picture.

She can't wait to help Mom plant the garden this summer.  She is my best helper.  As soon as the onion seeds get here, we'll see those inside.  Dirt in the house.  Does it get any better?

Seed Ordering

It is done!  My friend K and I sat down today and ordered our seeds.  She is a fabulous gardener, but new to veggies and wanted some input.  I got quite a few old favorites, but am also trying a few new things this year.   Among them are Tatsoi, and Prize Choy from Fedco, I'm excited to get into some of the Asian varieties.  Hubby is as well, since that means more Asian food on the menu. 

This is my first year buying spring and fall versions of some things.  Namely Nutribud Broccoli for the spring and Waltham for the fall from Pinetree.  Also from Pinetree will be Early Jersey Wakefield Cabbage and Danish Ball head cabbage. 

I'm interested to try a New Zealand spinach that is not a true spinach, but a perrenial.  K is from New Zealand, so this is very exciting for both of us to try.  The fact that it is a perrenial is fabulous as well.  I can't wait to try it.  Now, I just have to wait patiently for our seeds to arrive so that I can play with them!