Give me your toilet paper rolls!

I placed my order for seedlings and ended up spending the exact same amount of money as last year: $33.50. That's a pretty good deal for 66 individual plants. I actually e mailed a friend to see if she wanted to share the order since I definitely won't have room for all of it in my garden plot.

They didn't have beets so I ordered:
Tomatoes: Brandywine, Green Zebra and Pineapple (loved these last year even though I didn't get many) Sun Gold, Sweet Olive, Ciudad Victoria, Peacevine and Super Sweet 100s. I'll definitely need to narrow these down.

Eggplant: Nadia (same as last year) and Fairy Tale which are supposed to be purple with white stripes.

Basil
Parsley
Zucchini (just for the flowers so my brother can have a reason to buy a deep fryer)
Swiss Chard
and Marigolds

So I still have a lot of seeds to get: snap beans, lima beans, carrots and beets for sure! I think I have finally given up on peppers, at least for this year. I think 2 years of failure in a row means I should take a break. Perhaps this year I will really map out the whole plot and stick to the paper plan.

I also started collecting empty toilet paper rolls to ward off cut worms when I plant the seedlings. If you live in my area please feel free to save a few and hand them over next time you see me. I'm serious. I figure I'll need at least 20 or even 30 by May and I'm not quite sure how long it takes to go through TP in my house.

The Long Winter

I have been gone for a long time and for those of you who got used to my weekly posts I am sorry to have left and I hope you come back to read this. All of a sudden I am panicking at all of the garden related stuff I need to do. The deadline for ordering seedlings from the women's shelter that is also an organic farm is February 10th and I haven't even looked at the list yet!! Beets though, I definitely want to grow beets.

I am still enrolled in the Master Urban Gardener Program and planning to go to all of the classes that I can this Winter but, I've already missed 2. One, I had a good excuse for and the other...well...I had been out of town a lot and had just flown home the day before. I was really intending to go but, then it was insanely cold out and I just couldn't do it. I need to get back in the habit. They sent me a nice list of all of the classes I still need to make up and almost the whole list is highlighted. I'll be taking this free, weekly, class for 4 years at this rate.

Oh and can we talk about this weather? It's finally really cold but, I am sure that all of the warm weather for so long was not good for the garden. I had planted garlic bulbs in the fall and I don't think they were supposed to have sprouted anything green until the spring but, if you walk over to my garden plot now there are these little garlic shoots coming up. That's probably bad. I have learned some things since last year though. I'll be beginning my stash of toilet paper rolls (aka: cutworm protection) shortly.

Alright well more on the weather and classes and the porch compost and the Garden Steering Committee and my seedling selections next time.

I am glad to be back.