garden update... and I have babies!!!

We started some pie-pumpkins, broccoli & cucumbers from seed last week while waiting for the truly "safe" weather to arrive. While I don't see any broccoli yet, EVERY SINGLE SEED from the pumpkins & cucumbers came up! My daughter waters them twice daily, (it's very dry right now) and talks to them as she carries them outside each morning, and back inside each night... it's just too cute for words. I am SO excited to see how the cucumbers do! We eat them literally all the time here, so I'm hoping they're as high-yield as the catalog company claimed. It is so NICE to see green things again!

My daughter has chosen a botany-based science curriculum ("advanced" 4th grade) this year, and is absolutely ecstatic that part of her required lessons will be to maintain an indoor herb garden. It looks as if lavender will be given a chance, and she wants to try overwintering our existing lemonbalm & mint - any recommendations? I've never tried doing this, but I'm ALMOST as excited as she is about the concept.

My mom brought over some seedling tomatoes as well, and we are frantically scrambling to figure out where to put them as we now have four plants rather than the two we'd planned room for... one Roma, one grape, and two different types of cherry tomato. My son is rather disgusted - he's not a tomato kind of guy, and thinks we should toss all the 'maters out & grow extra carrots in their place. (sigh - I suppose there's no accounting for taste, huh?)

We are still waiting for that elusive warm weather... any day now my flowering crabapple should be bright pink, and the lilacs & rosebush are threatening to burst with their giant green buds as well. My beloved baby forsythia did not fare well this winter however. It would appear that a hungry bunny thought he needed it more than I did. (sigh, WHY couldn't he have eaten my husbands yukky spirea?!?)
love,
mom

 

i grew cucumbers the other year, but it was a plant that we grew on.. never tried it from seed, good luck =] i found that after the first few long ones, the rest started to curl a bit =/ but in our house we dont follow rules and we just chuck stuff in the ground and let it grow..

 

Thanks! I don't think our cukes are likely to curl - they're a 4" variety and my kiddies like to pick their veggies slightly smaller so they're still tender.
love,
mom

 

Our lilacs, lavendar and wisteria are done for the time being. They were spectacular. I'll try and post some picts. Only have one lilac left, my white died from lack of water a couple of years back. Roses are into their second bloom cycle now. Spring will come your way eventually I am sure. Finally put in a weigela. Have always liked them but never planted one at home until now.

How cold does it get where you are? I wouldn't recommend lavendar for indoor cultivation unless you really get cold where you are.

 

It gets pretty cold here - an average winter day is between 0 to -20F, and a COLD day would be closer to -40F. DD is having fun looking at all her options for herbs right now. I have one of those African-Violet stands, and we're thinking of putting a different herb pot on each of the little cups for her. She's researching which of her favorite herbs are more likely to thrive in a compact pot right now.

We just picked up a dozen pepper plants... DH came along and wanted purple AND yellow, and I found a really healthy Greek oregano that begged to come home with me too. Couldn't find any lemonbalm, but I'm hoping to find one this week. I really like my lemonbalm! And our broccoli finally sprouted too. Just waiting for the second set of leaves to form before we put them in the ground. May 15th is our last frost-day, so I'm thinking that Mother's Day will be our planting day again this year.

love,
mom

 

Oh my, I am tired and there is mud stuck in my fingernails even AFTER using the scrubbie-brush on them! But our garden is in!

This is our third year of container vegetable gardening, and I finally feel like we've got the hang of things. We didn't change much from last year, but even with just a couple minor changes we've managed to nearly double what we're growing. I started all sorts of seeds indoors, so even though everything was just planted the garden already looks nice. I'm definitely doing THAT again next year!

Here's what the garden looks like right now.


The "short side" of the deck. The left-side container is planted with seedling purple broccoli, the right-side is planted with yellow pepper transplants and red "green" onions. In the little container in the front, we tucked Greek oregano, and some lemon thyme.


The "tall side" of the deck. On the left are two cherry, and one roma tomato plant. The left-hand container has purple peppers, globe basil, sweet basil, and lemonbalm. The right-hand container was sprinkled with mixed leaf-lettuces, and the three pots to the right hold a globe-tomato, and two more purple peppers.


These are our experiments this year. To the left are our pumkins... but this year we're trying pie pumpkins rather than minis. And the photo to the right shows our cucumbers - started indoors, but only about 3" high right now. Not pictured are our chive & mint pots up on the deck, the pole-beans, or the carrots... they're all from-seed, so there's just nothing interesting to see right now.
love,
mom