Happy Hump Day

It's rained and it's chilly! It's a good thing I haven't put out the summer seedlings yet. The cold weather crops are doing great!


Kale and peas. I harvested some kale for dinner last night. It was delicious!


Escarole - They are about 8" in diameter now with lots of leaves! The little 4 leaf seedlings next to them are zinnias.


Broccoli is getting really big. I noticed some holes in the leaves. I'm not sure what to do about them. I read I can use row covers. I might do that.


Radishes and lettuce.


Bok choy - They are starting to look like bok choy now.


Spinach

My tomato and pepper plants inside the house are doing well. The tomatoes are really tall. The peppers are still slow, but they seem to be doing better since I gave them a larger pot. I'm sure the heat that we're getting this weekend will help.

FREE Seedlings!

Basil helped me give away my extra seedlings. Someone almost took Basil having mistaken him for a delicious herb she wanted to use for salads. Just kidding!



I put out all the extra seedlings that I can't use. In 20 mins, the neighbors had divided them amongst themselves and everything was gone!

It was a beautiful day to work outside yesterday. I planted some zinnias into the bed with my cucumbers and escarole. I repotted the pepper plants into large containers and started my squashes and watermelon seeds. I picked up some Verbena, Lantana, and Coleus for my planters on the deck.

The forecast is showing a week of raining which is great for the garden. It's quite chilly so I brought my other seedlings back inside instead of keeping them outside to harden off.

Happy Hump Day

We had a quick down pour of rain this week which helped move the veggies along in their growth. It looks like they had a growth spurt.


No tour is complete without a cameo by Basil. That's a raspberry plant next to him. They grow like wild fire, so I'm going to keep it in a large pot.


Pole beans are coming around. I staked them with a 6' pole which isn't enough. I just assumed it will go up and across the fence.


Broccoli plants are getting pretty big. They are about 10-12" across now.


My neat line of sugar snap peas. That's garlic in the very front of the photo.

Johnny Jump Up

It was a little chilly today, but it was the perfect day for some garden maintenance. In the morning, I set up a support for my sugar snap peas. I had something fancier in mind, but this worked last year, so why deviate from a good thing, right?


Basil is so awesome! When I garden, he feels the need to be involved. The peas' support is behind him along with 4 plants of Kale and some Johnny Jump Ups (aka Violas) along the edge.


JJUps are considered edible which is why I wanted to use them in the veggie garden bed. They also come in a variety of purples and yellows which are really pretty. They have such dainty flower petals.


I had an extra one which I potted with my Oregano that I overwintered in the house. Behind it is a Columbine with white flowers that my mom gave me last year.


Columbine 2009 - This is what it looked like last year.


The tomato plants were getting too large for the foam cups that I potted them in, so it was time to upgrade their crib until it's time to move out in mid-May. Of the 4 plants (of each variety), I only kept 2 of each. That's still 8 tomato plants which I'm going to need to find room for. This coming week is suppose to be in the 70s which will help the tomatoes take off. The peppers are still really slow to grow.

In other news, I had to do some damage control and dig up some perennials that my MIL gave me. They were so invasive that they were choking out my other plants. I tried doing it last summer, but the ground was too hard and the roots had really developed. Since it's still early and the soil is really moist from the rain, it was a lot easier to dig up. I hope I got it all. They had wrapped their roots all around my peony and roses.

Mid April Update

The fruits of my labor! From last summer and fall, I was working on planting flowers throughout the yard. It's really looking good. I wish you could all see it in person to get the overall view of the garden. In photos, it just doesn't do it justice.


Raised veggie bed. The transplants have settled in nicely and are grower now. It's still too early, but I did pop some pole bean and early-type cucumber seeds into the bed. The sugar snap peas have germinated and will need to be trellised soon. The garlic is also beginning to sprout! We'll have some garlic this fall.


Up-close of the escarole. There's lots of new growth from the center (heart). I use escarole in soups like Italian wedding soup or just any chicken & pasta soup. When eaten blanched or stir fry, it's very bitter.


Tomato and zinnia seedlings. The tomatoes took off last weekend when we had that burst of warm weather. It's about time that I repot them into their 3rd set of cups. By mid May, they will be ready to place outdoors. I'm going to mix Zinnias into the raised garden bed so that there is some color throughout.

In other news, the spinach, radishes, lettuce, and bok choy are doing well on the side raised bed. Some of my perennial herbs are coming back too.

Seedlings

It's been a busy week for me. I had this post saved and since then my seedlings have done a lot of growth so these photos are outdated now, but here they are anyway.

Early Spring Crops

The radishes, lettuce, spinach and bok choy seeds have germinated in raised bed along the side of the house.


You can start to see the pattern I created with the seeds in order to save space and sow herbs later as it gets warmer.


I cleaned up the back of the yard and look how pretty the tulips and hostas are coming up in their bright green colors. I can't wait to see what the blooms look like.



My husband mowed the lawn and edged along all my garden beds. It looks so nice when it's neat and tidy.

Over the weekend, I also sowed the pole beans, dill, and chard. It's too cold to start them, but I figured they will germinate when temperatures warm up. I just felt like sticking them into the ground so I wouldn't have to think about it later.