young broccolis

getting too big for their cardpots. Quite a few fallen over too, the stems too long.

But that's easily remedied by simply burying the stem a bit deeper when I set them into the ground.

They got covered with plastic cloches to keep slugs off until a bit bigger; you can see them in the very back of this picture.

From the front and working back there's the spot where my Peas are planted (I'm quite anxious they haven't come up yet!), next the last of the wintered Carrots, then wintered Lettuce (those beds will be planted with tomatoes and peppers soon). The fourth bed back, which you can see is darker, I just turned over today with compost, calcium (a jar of crushed eggshells) and a bit of lime for Tomatoes, they'll be ready to go into the bed in a few weeks. Fifth one back is already planted with spring Carrots (no sign of them yet either) and sixth, darker soil again just turned today for Peppers. Seventh has the plastic bottles covering my Broccolis, and behind that another row of Peas. Lots of stuff!

flowers

A walk through my yard. The front beds are full of bright Grape Hyacinths now.

Daffodils are fading as the Tulips begin to bloom; the first to open were the bright red

and some white ones. My favorites are the purples, I'm waiting for them.

rhubarb buds

The Rhubarb just keeps growing.

Today I noticed these swollen buds deep in the largest plant; at first I thought it was going to make another group of leaves but no; it's flower buds! I guess the fact that it's trying to flower means my plant is healthy and mature, but I must cut them off- otherwise the plant puts too much energy into flowering and not enough into the leaves for next year's growth. So I've read.

For the moment I've left them alone as they look so curious, but as soon as the stem lengthens a bit I'm going to chop them off.

more orange

Another lovely bunch of Carrots! After we eat these there will be one more dozen or so to pull, before I turn over that bed to grow tomatoes in...

and tomatoes

The rest of my Tomatoes aren't very big yet, but certainly filling up their seedling trays.

So this morning I moved them all into cardpots.

Every single seed I planted in these trays germinated, so I now have eight each of Beefsteak and Sweetie Cherry tomatoes; more than we need (plus the three mystery tomatoes already potted). I'll probably just set the largest ones into the garden and give the others away. Usually about six beefsteak and two or three cherry tomato plants make plenty for our little family.

thyme work

I've been drying my own Thyme. Every time one of the plants needs a trim I put the cut stems up to dry in a paper bag with a few holes punched in it, hung up. A few weeks later when a plant needs another trim, I take out the dried herbs and put the new cuttings in the bag to dry.

Then separate the leaves off stems to store. It's a bit of tedious work getting all the little leaves off but not too difficult. Holding them over a piece of clean paper, I pinch the (used-to-be) growing end with one hand, then gently pinch and run my fingers of the other hand back down the stem- they strip off pretty easy that way. Then fold a crease in the paper and tip it all into a jar to save for cooking.

Today the trimmings came off this thyme plant I'm trying to shape as a tree (doubtful how well I'm succeeding). Probably anyone who knows about bonsai would be horrified at my methods. I don't have any proper tools, so I've been training the thyme plant with wire leftover from this project, and trimming stems off with nail clippers. Yikes. But that's what I've got.

merry marigolds

More and more Marigolds! Those photos I posted the day before were actually about a week old; these little plants grew fast under the lamps (I don't have any actual grow lights but have been using just regular lamps in the house. They seem happiest under the energy-saver type bulbs that are twisty-shaped. Someday I'll get me some proper lights!) I had about twenty-six plants in this tray, and they're the best-looking Marigold seedlings I've grown yet. I really like this new method of using recycled trays with the lids still on them (I think this large square one used to hold muffins from the grocery-store bakery); it's far easier to keep them covered while germinating and then control the humidity when the seedlings are growing, just by adjusting how far the lid is open, or closing it up.

Anyway, they all got moved into cardpots today. Quite a few were droopy with shock afterwards, so I'm keeping them indoors for a day or two in the mudroom before putting them in brighter light or outside in the coldframe (if the weather is nice).

(All recycled materials- biodegradable pots are simply toilet-paper tubes, and the blue trays came from the grocery store- they used to hold mushrooms!)

Finally a year when I think I'll have enough Marigolds in the garden!

moving up

More repotting. The last two of the older Tomatoes and the four Peppers got moved into pots today. And set outside in the sun. I hope they like it; they're just getting too big to keep under lamps in the house now.

Lettuces!

Today I finally planted my baby Lettuces out into the garden. They were getting big enough in their cardpots.

Set out in the garden plot they look quite tiny

but up close appear robust and bright!

Around the edges of the same space I've set these Marigolds, which don't seem to be happy outside. I think it's still too cold for them.

They haven't grown very fast and their leaves are a lot darker than the younger ones still inside under lamps, which are much brighter green.

They're under plastic-bottle cloches to give more warmth and protection against slugs

The older Lettuce patch that overwintered is nearly depleted now. It takes two heads to make us a salad. You can see all the holes where I've been yanking them out!

young plants

Spent an hour doing stuff with little plants. First put my biggest Tomato plant into a pot (recycled container- used to hold soup!).

Then moved it outside into the plastic case. Moved the Broccolis into the plastic shelter too, as they were getting too tall for the coldframe. I'd put them in pots as well, as their roots are growing out the bottom, but am hoping this weekend when we have a day of sun I can just put them in the ground.

I've lost one broccoli and another Tithonia to chomping bugs, so before I put them into the plastic cover first carefully moved each cardpot into a new tray and checked between them. The lower sides of almost every pot had lots of little pill bugs clinging to them, hiding in the gaps. Found two small fat slugs, as well. Scraped them all off into the trash. Now the plastic container is full, I put the Tithonias in there as well, as they don't seem to like the cold. (The cardboard strips hold the sides up so it doesn't collapse on top of the plants).

The two seedlings trays of lettuce that had been under plastic got moved up, too. Put them all the little plants into short cardpots (toilet paper tubes cut in half). I really don't need more lettuce seedlings but hate to throw away growing plants! Perhaps I can swap them with someone on Craigslist for other plants... maybe a pepper or too, as I don't have many of those...

They're settled in the coldframe now.

carrots!

Pulled another bunch of wintered Carrots today. Not quite as big as the first bunch, but still very nice carrots! Had some cooked into a chicken pie...

anticipation

the Rhubarb is growing in leaps and bounds! Already the bigger leaves are nearly a foot across. They just love this cool weather and all the rain.

One of the stems got broken the other day (there was prediction of a late frost/snowfall and I freaked out over loosing my plants and covered them all up with various buckets, boxes and the plastic recycling bin. The Strawberry bed got covered with a blanket. Turned out the snowfall idea was a false alarm, but I wasn't taking any chances!) I broke the rest of it off, not wanting to tempt any bugs to invade the plant tissues, and the scent of that red stalk was just so delicious. It had me dreaming of pies already...

buds

Rain, rain. I can't get out to dig in the garden, so instead here's picture of things that cheer me up.

Tulip buds!

baby tomatoes

Here come the Cherry Tomato seedlings!

Now everything has sprouted in my trays except for a few of the herbs. It's too late for me to start any new seed, so we'll just have to make do with few peppers this year. I'm anxious now that everything gets big enough to go into the ground by mid-April, so I don't have to fret over seedlings when the baby comes. Although they will need watering and slug protection, but they also grow faster once outside in the ground...

parsley

Moved some of my tiny Parsley seedlings out of their tray into cardpots. I've got a handful from store-bought seed, and quite a few more from the seed I harvested out of my mom's garden.

They look a lot like celery seedlings to me. I wonder if the two plants are related?

gathered

There's a big evergreen hedge in the neighborhood that overgrows the sidewalk, and recently I've noticed its seed cones are springing open and dropping seeds on the ground. So I plucked a bunch off when walking by and brought them home.

I think it's a cypress.

I wonder if I can grow them into my own hedge, ha ha. Another growing experiment in the making!

more seedling news

There has been a slug in my coldframe. It ate a romaine lettuce seedling and a pepper seedling before I put a dish of beer in there and drowned it. But after bringing my peppers, tomatoes and basil plants inside, something kept chomping them- one morn the smallest Tomato plant was missing some leaves, the next morning one of my Peppers was just a bare stem! I suspected a slug again and put a teensy dish of beer out- but no luck with that. So today I potted up into cardboard tubes all those seedlings that were grouped together under the lamp, mostly with hopes of finding the slug. I did. It was a very little one, hiding between two cardpots of Tomato plants. Now I've only three of those left, but they're the ones I don't know the variety of, so I don't mind too much.

The little plants are all lined up in the windowsill now, instead of under lamps:

Here's the remaining Tomatoes.

I didn't get very many Peppers to grow at all, so it was dismaying to have so many eaten by slugs already! Now I only have three Bell Peppers left

and two from the Hot Pepper mix.

 A few Basil plantlets; there are five more in the second-seeded tray now as well.

leafing

The only surviving young tree I have from the Arbor Foundation, the flowering Crabapple, is putting out new spring leaves!

volunteers

I have found two more little evergreen trees of some kind growing in the grass. They're very small, and have a different look from the ones in the front I moved into the flower bed. I'm thinking of digging them up and putting in pots to watch grow bigger and see if I can identify.

Against the side fence in the back near shed two little shrubs are sprouting from the scraggly grass, too. They seem to be the same as the scrawny shrub against the fence that has small, dark blue berries in winter (I don't see any birds visiting it). I want to try and figure out what these are, too. Is it something planted on purpose? a native? an invader? worth growing and can I prune it to make it look nicer and full?

Here's a bit of twig I pulled off to look at closer. I pored through some tree-and-shrub identification books at the library today, but couldn't decide what they were.