Looks like dirt

When you first plant your garden in the spring, it mostly looks like dirt. We gardeners like to call it soil, and describe its properties at length, but when you sit in it a lot, you still get dirty.  This long weekend I planted as I always do, despite a substantial sinus cold.  Bending over is no good when you have a sinus cold, and planting late is equally painful, so sitting in the dirt was the best option.

Fortunately for me, Mike did a bit of the heavy work before he left for Anwyn's basketball tournament in Regina.  He was pleased with her silver medal; I was pleased that the potatoes, carrots and most of the peas were planted before he departed.  Because I plant in stages, I didn't have to do everything, but there was still a lot to do.

I started by transplanting my bedding plants.  Those are herbs, tomatoes (6 varieties), peppers (5 varieties)

and various members of the squash family. I did not plant pumpkins this year as I still have lots from last year, but I had two types of cucumbers, experimental cantaloup (unlikely to bear fruit in this zone), 2 varieties of zucchini, and butternut squash. I also put in corn, peas, green onions and kohlrabi that I planted early in the greenhouse last week. Many of the bedding plants go in various raised beds throughout the yard, but I still put some in the garden proper.

Once the bedding plants are done, I start with seeds. I plant flowers (like sweetpeas) and vegetables I grow from seed including beets, various greens, beans, parsnips, radishes etc. This year Leo and Anwyn both helped a bit with planting, which was great, because my planting speed was about one tenth normal Wendy. It is pretty hard to use your Kleenex with muddy hands, so I wore gloves and took them off all the time to blow my nose. I think it was a huge part of the slow down - it definitely had nothing to do with low energy due to sickness.

Now that the garden is all planted and so many of the flowers are blooming, it is a real pleasure to be out,

even when you are sitting in the dirt blowing your nose. I admired my flowers all weekend long and listened to my fountain. I planted a little sedum planter and felt like I did some great craft a la Martha Stewart. I enjoyed fresh asparagus, put basil on our burgers and had chives in my egg salad.  After 7 long months of winter, it is great to be dirty.

For those who'd like to see some pictures, you can see the album of what is blooming and take a look at the mulch Mike and Leo put in the front.

Already eating

Two weeks ago, it was still snowing.  This week, I am eating my first asparagus. It is supposed to rain all weekend, or I'd be planting up a storm.  Nonetheless, it is still so great to have green.

I have been puttering around my yard virtually very night.  Mike has to call me in from dreaming on the deck, weeding, planting and watering.  And now, he gets to add picking. He picked our first asparagus today, but the harvest will continue unabated for another month.  My spinach is up and we'll be eating that soon, and I also have garlic greens and chives ready to go. I am still 2 weeks from harvesting basil and mint, but my other herbs are great. I had fresh oregano in my soup for supper.

This weekend I planted a number of my flower boxes, and I also prepared many others for planting veggies. I made a beautiful succulent sculpture for my desk and did some transplanting in my flower beds.  I also started putting in my annuals.

One of my favorite things to do is enjoy what is blooming and consider what will bloom next. Last year at this time I wrote my yard was already full of flowers.  I can't say that now, but there are a few things blooming, including:

• two types of crocus
• chives
• tulips (only the yellow so far)

I have a number more buds (let's cal them flowers in waiting), but there has been too little sun this week for things to open up. I keep touring the yard thought, and I'm loving everything I do find.

First Flowers

A week ago we were getting our last snow.  I still have some ice around the base of the house, but it was 27 degrees yesterday, and I had my first flower bloom. Predictably it was white, a good bridge between winter and summer.  That's fitting since we seem to have skipped spring, although crocus are usually a spring flower. . . . I was so excited to be out this weekend, and there was so much to see and do.

The girls, Mike and I spent a couple of hours raking all the leaves off beds and pruning dead foliage. I leave it until the danger of a bad frost is gone, usually the third week of April.  You can see the post from April 10th last year to see what my yard looks like this year. We also set up the fountain, cleaned all the desk and patio space and set up all the lawn furniture. I brought the plants out to the greenhouse and Mike fixed the fence.  I had visions of laying in my hammock, but so far I haven't sat down long enough. Anwyn enjoyed it, though.

One of my plagues this year is the mice who moved into the greenhouse.  We've had the problem before, but mostly

in a minor way. This year the winter was a month longer, and the mice decided to eat all plants I was growing in the beds on the ground except for the onions. Apparently they like spinach, lettuce, beet greens and virtually all other greens, but even mice don't want raw onion.  Pip, who usually eats all mice, spent time trapped on the outside of the greenhouse (no cat door) while the mice cavorted inside. As a result, I spent the weekend paving over the places where there were tunnels in and Mike laid edging around the outside. Then we turned the compost and watched the mice try to break in to hide. Our defenses held against the first sortie. Pip chased three around the yard and Merry watched them confused. I was just delighted that I could fill the greenhouse with plants again and proud of Pip until she threw them up on the white carpet in the basement this morning.

Whatever is new is always main excitement in the spring. This year, it is garlic I got from my mother. I had it all labelled and planted, but the massive snow storms and bizarre thaw were destructive here too.  Fortunately, it was to the labels. The garlic, which my mother declared very hearty, survived without issue. It is all up, and growing much more quickly that the stuff of my own from last year. It is hard to see in this picture, but it has two days of growth in a loose bed against a fence and it is doing really well. Many stems are already about 8 cm high.


My plants are doing pretty well, but I am worried about how much harvest I'll get this year given the late spring. I have already planted spinach, beet greens and lettuces in a raised bed on my drive way, because I need to replace the mouse harvest. I think I may also buy some larger bedding plants to augment what I have in the greenhouse and give my garden a fighting chance.