How I Spent My (One Day) Vacation: Gardening

Yes, gardening! You may think that it's too early to garden here in frozen Wisconsin, but it's not.

Use your imagination...


This lunchbox full of seeds will soon turn into a variety of edible goodies covering my 1000 square foot vegetable garden (and small herb garden, and every other available patch of dirt around our lot).



Here are the seeds that I had intended to plant today*. They'll spend the next 4-8 weeks downstairs under the grow lights that my Dearest O built for me.

Boo likes to help. Um, thanks anyway, Boo!

Here's the full view of the grow light area. (Isn't it cool!?) My Dearest O still has to add a few lights and tweak a few things. (Isn't he awesome!?) When he's done, I'm going to surround the sides and back with reflective blanket, the idea being that it'll reflect the light and keep the growing plants warm. The lights aren't necessary now, but they will be as soon as the seeds germinate (5-21 days).













A closer look at the top shelf, with the seed plug trays resting on the heat mat. You're looking at 130 plants-to-be.













*Seeds Planted (3/24):

Tomatoes: Amish paste, Buckbee's New 50 Day, Black Cherry, Black from Tula, Black Plum, Black Zebra, Brandywine (red), Cherokee Purple, Chocolate Stripes, Eva Purple Ball, Moskovich, Nicholayev Yellow cherry, Peacevine cherry, Persimmon, Principe Borghese, San Marzano (16 varieties--Yep, call me crazy.)

Peppers: Pequillo pimento, Corno di Toro mix (red & yellow), King of the North (There'll be more if my pepper order arrives in time!)

Cabbage: Gonzales Baby

Tomatillos: Heirloom Purple and Toma Verde

Herb: French Rosemary and Creeping Thyme

Onion: Copra (long-day, storage)

Lettuce: Sucrine Romaine

Broccoli: Fiesta

Flowers: Mrs. Scott Elliot heirloom columbine

the end