Struggling toward spring

As you can see, we have some healthy green sprouts that popped up over the past couple weeks despite lots of cold, dreary weather. These are zinnias, and they are thriving. Our pepper sprouts aren't so impressive. It's just been too cold and not enough sun. We should really have a grow light or a heating pad, but I didn't want to bother with that stuff this year. Even Cat Friend was still in winter mode. She was smart and stayed in bed most days this week.



Likewise, we haven't done much in the garden for the past couple weeks because we've been too busy with traveling, work, and school. However, this weekend we took advantage of the slightly warmer weather and got a lot accomplished. Saturday was still pretty cold, cloudy, and damp so we bundled up and got to work. Our goal for the weekend was to plant all our herbs, lettuce, spinach, and peas. We found a neat design for an herb spiral in a permaculture book that Matt undoubtedly found at a thrift store for 25 cents. It's a really neat idea, and we found a pile of mossy old bricks by the barn which we used to build up the sides.





















Then we planted a few rows of spinach and lettuce on either side of the spiral. I'm really looking forward to eating fresh greens and herbs in about a month!







Finally, we planted peas along the shady side of our porch and out in the main garden. Even Cat Friend was on hand to help out!



We plan to tie strings up to the porch for the peas to grow on, and we made a tepee trellis out of willow branches that Matt cut down out in the main garden. This will be our first attempt at peas, so I hope it goes well. We're a little late getting them in the ground, but hopefully it won't get too hot for a while. We used an inoculant from Johnny's for the peas, so we'll see what happens. Again, I can't wait to chomp on some fresh sweet peas from the garden! I'm imagining a big bowl of spaghetti carbonara with peas. And we got a variety that produces a lot of tendrils which you can also pick and eat. Perhaps I'm just hungry, but the thought of all this green food is making me drool!





It's so refreshing to be outside watching the grass turn green and the beginnings of spring flowers. This is the payoff for enduring the endless days of winter!

Spring is here! Time to start a garden...

This was our first real weekend in the garden this spring. Matt extended the flower bed so now we have more than double the space we did last year. We also made a batch of potting soil and started our first round of seeds. We didn't get around to planting anything outside just yet, but we were able to admire some sprouts popping up--signs of success from all our hard work last fall!

Of course we've been planning our 2011 garden for quite a while now. We ordered seeds in late January, and last weekend we went to Lowes for all our seed starting supplies. It's still pretty early here in Central Pennsylvania, but we wanted to get a head start in order to improve upon our 2010 garden. Last year was our first try at growing a garden (as a married couple, at least). It was a hot, dry summer, and we ate and canned a ton of tomatoes, green beans, hot peppers, and okra. However, we were done in by squash beetles, and our zucchini and pumpkins were obliterated. I kept meaning to keep a garden journal last year, but I never did. I'm hoping this blog will serve as a way for me to keep track of our successes and failures this year. Plus, it will be nice to have a collection of pictures from the season.


We decided to increase the size of our flower bed this year because we knew we were going to be planting more than we did last year. We share our main garden space with our landlord and his family, so we can't expand very much there. Plus, we were able to extend the lines beyond an old satellite dish that gives Matt fits when he has to mow the lawn. Now we will have more flowers, herbs, and greens right by the house and less grass to mow!










Our main goal for the weekend, however, was to start seeds. We were excited to try out our new soil block maker that we purchased from Johnny's Selected Seeds. Here is a video showing Martha Stewart using the same tool!
http://www.johnnyseeds.com/t-videomartha.aspx
Since our lives are basically just like Martha's, we set about starting perfect seeds that will grow into perfect plants that will be harvested for perfect meals.


We didn't purchase Johnny's "recommended" potting soil, but luckily they provide a recipe. Here it is if you are interested:
www.johnnyseeds.com/assets/pdf/soil%20Block%20Maker.pdf
We purchased all the materials from Lowes. We halved the recipe, and that gave us more than enough for three trays of soil blocks. In fact, we probably have enough left over to make another three trays in a couple weeks when we start out tomato plants.

We had a little trouble getting the soil to the right consistency (like peanut butter). At first we added too much water, but I remembered the wise words of Pee Wee Herman and knew there was a solution to every problem. Just add more soil!











So our first experiment with making our own soil mix and soil blocks was a success! Although we won't know how successful it really was until we start seeing seeds sprouting. I'll post updates as things start growing!


Perhaps the most satisfying part of the weekend, though, was pulling up mulch to find flowers and garlic sprouting. We planted a ton of spring bulbs last fall, and it looks like we're going to have a beautiful bed of tulips, daffodils, hyacinths, and other random flowers that I bought when they were 50% off last fall. In addition, Matt planted two rows of garlic that we received from Matt's parents' crop last year. The spring weather is a welcome change, and it makes the season even more enjoyable when I can finally reap the rewards of our work all those months ago.



Hopefully I will be able to keep up with this blog. I might let things slide toward the end of the semester. If I take my comprehensive exams over the summer, I will definitely be preoccupied with writing about social theory and feminist methodology instead of eggplants and green beans. Regardless, I look forward to another year of gardening--a journey to the final product!



One last note, our cat was not much help this weekend. She will often provide company and entertainment in the garden, but she's still not sure about being outside too much yet. Here's what she was up to while we were working: