Spring Seeds

As I was driving into town today, the car's thermometer read twenty-two degrees below zero.  That's a pretty normal temp hereabouts, but even here it is a bit TOO cold for the end of March!  It amazes me sometimes, the optimism that it takes in order to build fires against -22 degrees while at the same time planning for putting seeds into the ground to grow in a mere two month's time.

On Sunday, I went to a seed swapping bruch at Maple and Me's.  You can admire my valiant restraint as you notice that I only came home with 7 packets of seeds!  I should have expected such a thing.  Faced with a table full of so many varieties of unprouted plant live, so many different beautifully manifesting hopes for the future, my "I'm not going to plant anything this year except perrenials" somehow evaporated...  You see, this summer season is about the deep preparation that will support the next few decades on our land: pigs, pastures, perrenials, prep.... and now peas!  Peas give fix nitrogen into poor soils and can be direct-seeded even this far north.  And they're yummy.  And fairly simple to grow as I recall.  So that justifies two of these seed packets.

Another three are flower seeds from a dear friend's garden in Junea (she just happen's to Maple & Me's mother): primroses, day lillies, and blue poppies.

The other two packets I managed to come home with are some beets from Pingo Farm, a local farm that has been breeding vegetable strains from Russian seed stock to do well in our Zone 1 climate.  They have sweet peppers and cantelope and watermelon and tomatoes too!!!!  Next year.  Next year.  Not this year. 

And I also brought home 9 summer squash seeds.  Assuming a 100% germination rate, that's perfect for three mounds, which can be placed away from the pig pen/garden to be, and only require hauling in a pickup truck full of topsoil and/or manure - I'll use the rest to get going on the flower bed by the house.  These ones I will start in the house just as soon as I remember to stop by a gardening shop for some good soil.  Squash plants in the 4-5 inch range transplanted in late may do well, I'm told.  We have one more year's subscription to Calypso's CSA veggie share for this summer - thanks mom! But I find that we never get enough summer squash for the mounded dinner plate full I crave once or twice a summer.  Besides which, the freeze well and are great in winter soups.

So that's the story of why I broke down and brought home seeds.  That, and despite my place-my-energy-into-prep-work-it-will-pay-off-down-the -road intentions, I really can't quite imagine a summer without something growing which means that I'll likely pick up parsley and calendula and cilantro seeds along with that soil.

In other news, hiding down here at the bottom of the post where the Darlin'Man is least likely to notice it:

There are three birthdays in my family within the next month, so I've been busily contemplating all the things I will make.  And then last night I sat down and put a dent in my man's gift.  Though, I am a little concerned that I'm losing what little hipster cred I have by opting for nicely, perhaps even traditionally, sized cross stitches as opposed to the oversized one that are popular on design blogs. 

Happy Beltaine

The first of may.  Beltaine.  May Day.  A day of celebration of life renewing, the flowers of spring.
I noticed today that the birch trees and also the lilac by my mother's front door were starting to bud, beginning new leaves for the coming season.  Also?  It snowed.
Snowed.  As in cold air and light flakes and an overcast sky.  Last week, it was so warm I left doors and windows open- deciding I would rather the fresh air and scents of warming earth than the safety from the mosquitoes.
On the bright side, hopefully the late frost and snow will have killed off a generation or two mosquitoes and we'll have a bit of a reprieve at the beginning of the bug season.  On the less bright side, I left my tray of calendula starts out on the porch too long (ok, I forgot about them and they were out all night) the other day, and so now most of my very vigorously promising starts are no longer.  Fortunately, this was about a day before the echinacea seeds started sprouting, so they're okay.

Happy May Day!  May you grow into the year ahead with much creativity and joy!

Easter Egg Starts

We didn't do much to celebrate Easter.  Somehow this year, marking the solar equilibrium and the shift from the dark of winter to the sunlight of summer - whether the pagan Eostre or the Christian Easter - on a specific date with grand celebration has not felt truly appropriate to my heart.  Instead, it has felt like a slow and incremental process with lengthening days and slow trend towards warmth.  

My mother gave us Lindt chocolate bunnies, and there were some wilting tulips in a vase from the bouquet my mother in law gave me a couple weeks ago.  But that was about it.  Instead I planted seeds of Calendula and Echinacea.  In honor of Easter, and because they make frugal and ecological sense, I planted some of them in eggshells.  Planting starts in eggshells is an idea I saw on Pinterest, so I'm dedicating this post to Julochka's "pinspiration" series.  I can't find the original idea inspiring pin, but here's another that I have enacted in my kitchen but haven't taken a photo of.  Its remarkably effective.

Anywho.  About the eggshell seed starters.  I'm pretty excited about the idea because it seems to me that when planting them, it will be really easy to crack/crumble the shell around the seedling root ball without damaging the little tender rootlets.  The problem with the "bio-degradable" kind of seed starter trays where you can supposedly just plant the cardboard little pot directly into the soil is that, well, you can't.  Because unless maybe if we're talking about corn starts, the roots just aren't vigorous enough to bore through the industrial compacted paper product.  So you either resign yourself to suffocating your starts' roots inside a tiny cardboard package, or you break and peel open the casing when you go to plant out.  Which traumatizes the roots that are stuck to it, and adds to the shock the plant experiences going into the ground.  I have high hopes for egg shells.

But.  I hadn't stared saving them soon enough.

And I found one of those industrial style ones for free.

As you can see, its the kind that has its own little plastic greenhouse deal.  I was grocery shopping a couple weeks ago, and as I was driving along the sort of little access road to the store, I saw, sitting right in the middle of the road, this brand new in-packaging seed start kit.  So I quick put on my flashers, hit the brakes, jumped out, and fished it out from under the truck.  It must have blown off of someone's neglected car roof, or out of the back of someone's truck.  Thanks to them, whoever they are.  I sure appreciate it.

I'm not doing 'much' of a garden this summer, what with being gone for June and having lots of projects and all.  But, I do have a basket of seed packets from last year as well as some that are dated for 2010 which I think we found at the Transfer Site.  We'll see how they do for germination.  Can't hurt to put them in some soil.  And I'd hate to waste seeds!  I'll keep you updated with what I plant as I do so....

In other news.  I saw my first spot of bare ground at home today!