The End is Nigh . . . saying goodbye to the garden.

Am I growing mutant dwarf carrots?!?!

That's my pinky nail!

So after procrastinating quite a bit, then putting it off a bit more, then getting caught up in other things . . . I decided it was finally time to start taking down the summer garden and preparing the planter boxes for winter. I have hopes of growing garlic and shallots over the winter and have to get them in the ground before the first frost (which may or may not have already happened in Seattle, I guess depending on your definition of cold). So that meant getting rid of the massive entanglement of vines, leaves, and other plant matter that had taken over the back yard.

Pretty scary, huh? Yeah, I should have done this along time ago. It was a mess! Vines wrapped in vines, wrapped in leaves, wrapped in dirt, wrapped in an enigma, wrapped in a riddle . . . where am I going with this? Oh yeah, it was bad. Most of the tomatoes that were left had started to rot on the vine, including this beautiful heirloom tomato, one of the few to actually turn red:

It looked great from the top but as soon as I picked it up, the whole bottom half was eaten out and mushy. Kind of like the tomato version of Jaws . . . dah dum dah dum dah dum dah dum dah DUM!

I was sad to miss out on a good heirloom, but not so much about all of the cherry tomatoes that were still hanging around.

Lesson Learned #1 - don't buy more than 2 tomato plants. Five plants is definitely too many.

At this point, we are tomatoed out. We currently have 2 gallon sized bags full of marinara sauce in the freezer that my wonderful husband made, as well as half a jar in the fridge, all ready for a quick pasta meal. We seriously have no more room for tomatoes. Maybe in the future, if I start canning or something, then the five tomato plants will be awesome, but for now they just became a chore. Every time we looked into the backyard, there they were, the newest batch of ripe tomatoes, taunting us with a "we're ripe, pick us, we're ready." It became so annoying that we started avoiding even going into the backyard. Well today I am reclaiming our yard . . . just in time to shut it down for the winter anyway, but hey, it's the principle of the matter.

So pretty much all of the cherry and heirloom tomatoes were rotted on the vine or on the ground (it was seriously like a bad Shakespeare play, rotten tomatoes everywhere!), but not the Romas! Roma tomatoes must be the hardiest tomatoes around because you can seriously forget about them and let them sit in wet, rainy muck for weeks and they still come out looking perfect, beautiful, and red. I know because this is exactly what I did, but look what I was able to pick out:

Of course I have no desire to keep these in my house, so they were immediately washed up and spirited away to the neighbors' house up the street. She still thinks tomatoes are cool.

So I struggled with the tomato plants for about 45 minutes and let me tell you, they did not want to go! I guess I didn't realize that tomatoes had such thick roots, and long . . . I feel that I probably left a bunch of roots still in the soil but I'll take care of that when I till everything again and add new soil. Once I got the tomato plants out of my planter box and into the yard waste bin, I found some interesting things going on underneath.

Like this pepper:

This was the only thing my pepper plant produced this season. Sure the plant looks great (well it did until I pulled it up and threw it away) but it was essentially a non-producer.

Lesson Learned #2 - don't buy pepper plants, they don't grow! I can only surmise that even after the longest summer in recent history here in Seattle, the weather is just not warm enough for grow peppers reliably. So I'm saying no to peppers next year.

I also found my carrots growing full force. I had originally planted the carrot seeds around the tomatoes because I had read about companion gardening and learned that tomatoes and carrots go really well together. Basically it's not only a good use of a small gardening space but the nutrients in each helps to enrich the other. I definitely think that the tomatoes got the better end of that deal. They grew rampant while the carrots, well . . . see for yourself:

And after a bath and a haircut:

As you can see, they are not very big. In fact I would say some are even miniscule!

To be fair, I did plant a type of carrot that was supposed to be smaller than normal so that they would grow well in a container garden, but I'm pretty sure they aren't supposed to be THAT small. Also, since the tomatoes grew with such abandon, the carrots definitely didn't get enough light. So while I think companion gardening is cool, light is at a premium in my garden and I don't want to make it harder for a plant to grow, so . . .

Lesson Learned #3 - Plant carrots on their own and in a container. Since they are made for containers, I think I will plant them in one next year. That way I can make sure they get enough sunlight and really grow to their full (smallish) potential. We will be eating these though, because they are good! I tasted one raw and it was delicious! This is going to sound silly, but they really tasted "carrot-y" more so that anything I've tasted in a long time. I guess it's true that things really do lose a lot of their flavor on the trip from the farm to the store. I will definitely be growing these again next year.

So all of the tomato plants and any other thing growing in the planter boxes have been removed either to my kitchen or the compost bin. The next job is to turn the soil over and add some organic fertilizer to get it ready for the garlic and shallots that I shall plant . . . oh, one of these days.

I would have done the soil today but I accidentally walked into a huge spider web and had somewhat of a gigantic freak-out. There was much jumping around and slapping at my hair and upper body. I'm assuming it looked crazy dorky because the UPS man who had come around to the back of the house to drop off a package just as it happened gave me the strangest look. I tried to explain but he just shook his head and handed me a box. Oh well, I'm sure he's seen worse . . .

And the box? A very nice surprise! A couple of weeks ago I entered a contest online at Tough Cookie Mommy and won a Divine Chocolate Gift Pack from Divine Chocolates USA! It was filled with 4 yummy chocolate bars, 2 bars of baking chocolate, and a container of Cocoa, all Fair Trade and owned by the Kuapa Kokoo farmers. Check out their website for more info because it's a really great company!

Lesson Learned #4 - always entered contests with chocolate as a prize because it's really awesome when you win!

So a long put off task was accomplished and my reward was chocolate! If I'd have known there was going to be chocolate, I would have done it a lot sooner.

Next time - turning the soil, planting the garlic, and picking the pumpkins.

Until then,

Cheers!

- Christine

The Unseasoned Baker: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins!

So I do a lot more than garden (obviously since I really don't do all that much gardening), but today I did something really fun with my little guy, Weston. We made another batch of Weston's Famous Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins!

Fall weather (yes, it is starting to get a little chilly here in the Pacific NW) really makes me think of pumpkins and I thought baking would be a fun project on a slightly sleepy morning for both of us.

I found the original recipe here and modified it a little:

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

• 4 eggs
• 2 cups sugar (I only added 1 cup and it's definitely sweet enough!)
• 1 (16 oz.) can pureed pumpkin (Since I could only find a 15 oz. can, I mashed up an overripe banana and added it to the mix - no complaints. I've also used 2 tablespoons of applesauce as well)
• 1 1/2 cups oil (I used 1 cup coconut oil and 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil- seems really oily when you first mix it in but trust me, it's necessary)
• 3 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I've left this out on several occasions and it still tastes great!)
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 package chocolate chips

In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs, sugar, pumpkin, and oil until smooth. Add in dry ingredients and mix well. Fold in chocolate chips. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups 3/4 full. Bake 16-20 minutes at 400 degrees.
Makes 24-30 muffins.

Weston helped by cracking eggs into the bowl (and yes, I fished out all of the shells), pouring the sugar, pumpkin, and flour, and mixing it all up with the mixer. Mixing is definitely his favorite part, if you ask him about making muffins, he'll automatically say "I mix it!" So cute :)

They turned out great! And they sure smelled like pumpkins and fall :)

Weston enjoyed them!

 (this picture is actually from the last time we made these muffins - about a week ago - but he looked pretty much the same eating them this time!)

Even though I can't eat them right now (I'm on a gluten-free diet for another week), I've been assured by several people that they are the best!

So there's no time like the present, make these muffins now!

Cheers :)

- Christine

Potato Farming in Seattle!

Hey, remember me? I know it's been a long time (a whole summer in fact) but I'm back from . . . well back from life, I guess. That's the funny thing about life, it totally gets in the way of what you plan to / mean to / want to do. And since I'm definitely the type that takes on way too much all at once, well, that means this blog has sat dormant for the past couple of months. But it's my goal to get back into it and keep blogging on a more regular schedule. Wish me luck!

So where was I? Oh yeah . . . I had these two adorable planter boxes and was attempting to grow things in them. Well guess what? It worked! Things grew . . . some grew really big and some grew really little and some grew not at all. And some went nuts and took over the whole garden (I'm looking at you, tomatoes!)!

To compare:

My planter boxes at the end of May:

Nice and orderly, yes?

And my planter boxes now:

Basically the tomatoes took over. They would not stop growing! For a long time, we had nothing but little green tomatoes everywhere and I was afraid that Seattle would remember its usual weather pattern (of rain and cold) and we'd end the season with relatively useless green tomatoes (yes, I know you can make fried green tomatoes or tomato salsa or tomato chutney, but really?). Well obviously that wasn't the case. Seattle has had a very warm summer that has been extended to a warm and sunny fall. Nice for people and for plants and my tomatoes have been thriving. In fact, I've stopped watering them completely because we just don't have any more room for tomatoes. Bart has made a batch of delicious marinara sauce that we've eaten and frozen for later, and he's about to make another batch today to use up these:

And you can see from the picture that we have still more tomatoes that are turning redder every day. I'd say we have enough for another batch of sauce and then I'm done. We just don't have that big of a freezer and I'm not ready for canning anything yet.

So I guess it's nice to know that I do have the ability to grow tomatoes, but the lesson learned for next season is NOT to buy 5 tomato plants. That's way too many. Next year, I'll try to remember to buy less.

As for the zucchini, they did well too . . . for a while, and we got some very large zukes:

But then they succumb to some kind of white mold on the leaves and pretty much stopped producing. I pulled the plants and then the tomatoes basically took over that space as well. The peppers were duds; no hot peppers at all and we got two tiny green peppers that we didn't eat because they basically shriveled up and looked really weird after we picked them. I think it's too cold for peppers here, even if we have what's considered a "good" Seattle summer. Another lesson, no peppers next year.

Another lesson learned: grow potatoes! A lot of them! After reading this article, I decided to throw 3 potatoes (2 reds and a russet) that I had on the counter and forgot to use into the ground to see if anything would come of it. Well something definitely came of it! I pulled up the potatoes today because I wanted to have roasted potatoes for dinner tonight and this is my haul:

Can you believe it! That's a lot of potatoes! And yes, some of them were quite small, but there were a lot of good sized ones too. I'm excited to see how "fresh" potatoes taste!

Seriously growing potatoes is the easiest things, I'm definitely doing it again next year. You just put the potato in the ground and cover it with dirt. Ideally, you're supposed to continue to cover any plant growth until you have a mound about a foot high (this will allow your plant to grow more and more potatoes) but I forgot to do that and basically forgot about the potatoes as well. Forgot about them so much that often I didn't even water them (oops!). But look what happened anyway! I wonder how many potatoes I would have harvested if I had actually taken any sort of care with them? I guess I'll have to find out next year :)

The pumpkin patch is doing OK as well (see lack of water excuse above) and we have 4 small pumpkins including this one, which is the biggest:

Since I can't remember what kind of pumpkin it is, I'm not sure if it's supposed to turn orange or not, but I'm going to wait until about the week before Halloween and then pick it and put it on the front steps for decoration. Apparently, growing pumpkins is as low-maintenance as potato growing. Next year, I'll try to stay on top of the whole watering thing and see if I can get some bigger pumpkins.

My goal for this week is to pick the rest of the (blasted) tomatoes, plus see how the onions and carrots are doing. Then I'll trim back the tomatoes a little and plant some arugula starts that I received from a friend. With the way lettuce has previously grown in our yard, I have no doubt we'll enjoy some nice salads before the first frost hits.

I'm also starting to think about planting my winter garden, including garlic and some flower bulbs that will grow next spring.

Thanks for rejoining the planting party and have a great week!

- Christine

The Bountiful Harvest, or Why We're Having Salad for Dinner Every Night This Week + an Update

Salad, salad, everywhere . . . as far as the eye can see.

Is there such a thing as too much lettuce?

I've picked 4 of the 6 lettuce starts and we've had salad with dinner for the past 6 nights . . . and there is still lettuce that needs to be picked! Plus, the lettuce starts that I did already pick are starting to regrow at a very rapid pace. So it looks like salad will be on the menu for a while longer. Good thing we all love salad . . . and that we have enough ranch dressing in the pantry!

The rest of the garden is growing, along with the lettuce:

Planter Box #1

Everything is growing! The herbs are going crazy and I think we are going to have to make something with the cilantro (in the bottom, right corner) . . . maybe my wonderful husband's famous guacamole?

What's that I see? A sprout!?

The green beans have sprouted! The green beans have sprouted! Well, only 2 of the green beans have sprouted but I have high hopes for the rest of them.

Planter Box #2 is also doing pretty well.

Planter Box #2

The zucchinis have really grown quite a bit and even though the peppers are doing OK - though I can tell that they are suffering in the cold. Some of the leaves are a bit brown and they all seem rather wilted. But good news was hiding under one of the leaves:

You can't stay hidden for long!

A small flower on the Italian Sweet Pepper plant! Maybe they are going to make it!

Speaking of making it . . . the strawberries don't mind the cold. All of them have flowers, but this one has 2!

2 for the money!

In other news . . . I finally planted the pumpkin/potato/leek patch!

No there aren't any bodies buried here!

The potatoes are planted in the 2 grave-like locations at the bottom of the picture, the pumpkin seeds are in the small piles in the middle, and a little beyond the pumpkin piles, are a row of leek seeds. It looks pretty crappy now, but hopefully soon it will be lush and green and filled with mini-pumpkins!

Keeping my fingers crossed!

Cheers!

- c

The First Harvest and an Update

The weather has been yucky lately and, though some of my plants are having trouble adjusting to the colder temperatures, many are thriving in the rain!

Planter Box #1

Planter Box #1 seems to be doing very well . . .  even with the coating of white petals that have  basically taken over our whole backyard. The neighbor's tree (which actually leans mostly into our backyard) decided it was time to grace us with the large clusters of tiny flowers it had been growing. Now our yard looks like the victim of a May snow storm. I asked my husband, B, how we were supposed to get rid of all these tiny, white petals . . . his response? "Snow Blower?" Ummm . . . ok?

Anyway . . .  the lettuce starts are growing like, well, weeds! In fact, they've become so huge that I knew it was the right time to actually pick a few of them and have them for dinner. I know I've been saying for about a week that we were going to have actual "garden" salad for dinner, but tonight it actually happened.

Before

After

I tried to leave about a half inch stalk on each one, in the hopes that there would be some regrowth, but as you can see . . . even though I only harvested three starts, there was a lot of lettuce there!

Yum! Where's the dressing?!

The perfect amount for a hardy salad to go with dinner! After a wash and a spin in the salad spinner, we ate it and it was pronounced "great!" If you're wondering if it had a different, better taste being homegrown instead of store-bought . . . well, not really. I didn't notice a difference but then again, I'm not a lettuce connoisseur so . . . it was tasty, had a good crunch, and I was proud to say I grew it myself and that's good enough for me :-)

Also happening in Planter Box #1, the Black Cherry Tomato has the first blossom of the season!

The first blossom!

And the spinach and lettuce seeds are really starting to grow . . . which means I'm going to have to do some thinning soon.

Insert spinach and lettuce here

Planter Box #2 is doing pretty well too.

You can really see the "snow" here

The zucchini plants are growing and the Roma and SuperSweet 100 tomatoes seem to be doing ok. The Basil and the Peppers are definitely struggling in the cold. In fact, I think the Basil might be a couple of more rainy days away from fading gently in the night. Be strong, little Basil . . . it's got to get warm sometime, right? The Peppers aren't on death's door quite yet, but they are certainly looking a little "wilty" though there are some buds hiding tightly coiled by the base of one of the leaves. I'm hoping they can also hold out until that warm weathers comes.

Strawberries!

The strawberries are doing well and seem to be alright with the rain. In fact the one plant at the very top of this picture has a flower on it that I hope will one day bloom into a beautiful strawberry. Ironically enough, this plant with the flower is the very same plant that a certain little man has stepped on countless times in his haste to get to the planter boxes. Who knew that W apparently has magic growing feet? I guess that means that the blueberry twig he stepped on and broke a couple of weeks ago should start growing like crazy any minute now!

Flower Power!

Crazy Columbine

Last year's left-for-dead Columbine plants are certainly showing me that they are alive and kicking. I love the color combinations! They are growing so large that they are in danger of blocking out some of the sun from my planter boxes . . . I'm going to have a talk with them about that and hopefully they will tone it down. Or I just might pick some of these beautiful flowers and enjoy some of them indoors.

Dahlia! Dahlia! Dahlia!

The Dahlias are starting to get some giant buds on them as well . . . I'm hoping for some huge flowers from these babies later in the season. I didn't realize it when I planted them here, but this little area gets a ton of light and they are thriving (even though the sunlight has been scarce lately, they will take whatever they can get)!

Still haven't gotten around to planting my pumpkin and leeks seeds, or the potatoes, but that is still on the agenda. Maybe this long weekend, if the weather turns nice.

Keep wishing for sunshine!

Cheers!

- c

Tomatoes and Peppers and Zucchini, Oh My!

The new additions have arrived!

Tuesday evening my long awaited tomato, pepper, and zucchini plants arrived from the green house and were ready to be planted. Though I did debate about keeping them inside for a little while longer, since the weather is going to cool down over the next week and nights are still pretty chilly, I ultimately decided to just go ahead and plant them. I know myself better than to think anything good will come of leaving plants indoors in this house. I'm sure I would either forget to water them or they would get knocked over. So into the ground they went!

Planter Box #2 - suddenly filled up!

Planter Box #2, which had been pretty empty for a couple of weeks with just the Basil, onions, and carrot seeds to keep each other company, bore the brunt of my digging. I ended up planting 4 tomato plants (2 Super Sweet 100s, an heirloom tomato plant, and an Early Girl), 2 Zucchini, and 2 peppers (1 Green Bell and 1 Red Italian Sweet). Then I stuck my handy tomato trellises in, watered completely, and they were all set to grow!

Planter Box #1 gets a new addition too!

Somehow I ended up with an additional Golden Pepper plant and, not wanting to overcrowd the pepper plants in the other box, I popped it into Planter Box #1. You can see it there on the right side of the box between the green bean trellis and the lettuce. I have a sneaking suspicion I may have put some more lettuce or spinach seeds in that exact same spot a couple of days ago, but . . .  oops, oh well! :-)

While I was digging and planting, I noticed some other interesting things were started to sprout:

Carrots!

Yes, the carrots in Planter Box #2 have finally started to sprout! So we may have some yummy carrots at the end of summer after all.

The spinach marches on . . .

The spinach seeds are also coming up like crazy . . . I'm supposed to tidy them up when they get two inches high and it looks like they have less than an inch to go. Then I'll cull the plants until they are spaced out about 2 inches apart. My gut tells them to just leave them all because the more plants that grow means the more spinach we'll have to eat, right? Apparently not if I want to have actual edible and abundant spinach . . . keeping them all would just crowd everyone and make them unhappy. And unhappy plants do not grow and produce . . . so I guess that means I'm be culling those spinach plants some time next week.

Today was pretty overcast but the sun is trying to peep through . . . I hope it does because my new plants need sunshine!

Cheers!

- c

Some New Additions, Week 3 Update and a Memorial

Seattle has been experiencing some beautiful weather -  and both people and plants are thriving!

A belated Happy Mother's Day to all the mommies out there! We spent the day eating the best croissants in Seattle and beautifying the garden.

Wine and beer . . . included. The wonderful husband is all mine!

We bought some great Adirondack chairs from Fred Meyer (plus a little W-sized chair as well) and did quite a bit of relaxing in the sun.

The S.S. Weston!

Our backyard neighbors gifted us with a tugboat sandbox, just the right size for W. He spent most of the afternoon yelling "boap" and throwing rocks into the bottom. I believe that's his idea of a perfect afternoon :-)

We did do some actual work though:

Awaiting pumpkins . . .

My wonderful husband, B, tilled the future pumpkin (and potato and leek) patch and bought some compost so it is all ready for planting. He had quite a time removing the bamboo stalks (those suckers have some DEEP and STRONG roots!) and was only able to saw the tops of the stalks off above the soil . . . so we'll probably be revisited by bamboo next year. But at least he'll know what to do. My goal this week is to dig the trenches for the potatoes and plant the leek and pumpkin seeds. I found information on growing potatoes here at one of my favorite gardening blogs, One Hundred Dollars A Month.

We also suffered a loss this week in the garden:

R.I.P. 5-13-12

Someone (and I won't name names, but this person has tiny little feet and is known for running wild through the garden, yelling "Was Dat?!?!") stepped on the poor little twig of a blueberry plant and broke it off from its roots. Now it truly IS just a twig. Oh well, guess that means no homegrown blueberries this season . . . unless I can get my hands on another plant (preferably one that looks like something more than a twig!).

Now for the Week 3 garden tour:

Planter Box #1 . . . sprouting and proud!

Planter Box #1 is doing great! The lettuce is almost ready to be harvested, I think! Several websites I read (and one video) gave me a good idea of when to pick it (when it grows between 4-6 inches) and how to ensure regrowth (leave 1/2 inch of the stem). We are almost there! I'm thinking that maybe Thursday or Friday would be a good day for a garden salad. More good news, both the spinach and leaf lettuce seeds have sprouted and are forming 2 wonderful lines of green stems. I know I'll have to cull them a little when they get bigger, but for now I'm enjoying the abundance of future salad fixins! The beans haven't sprouted yet (I really think the weather hasn't been warm enough) so I went ahead and planted 5 more seeds, but I have to admit that I did see a newly sprouted green bean seed starting to grow underground, so I'm confident I will see something very soon. And before you wonder, how did I see what was going on . . . UNDERGROUND? Well, let's just say that someone (yes, the same someone that stepped on the poor blueberry twig) pulled out one of the trellis twines and when I was digging it back into the soil, I saw the sprouted seed. I quickly covered both the seed and the twine with soil and let it be. I'm hoping the seed didn't see me and doesn't become too shy to find its way to the surface :-)

The Basil has friends . . . finally!

Planter Box #2 is still awaiting several tomato, pepper, and zucchini plants (which will arrive on Tuesday and hopefully be planted soon after!), but I was able to plant some more Walla Walla onion starts at the far end to join the lonely Basil and yet-to-sprout carrot seeds. The onion starts came from a neighbor and friend who already had too many onions so she offered them to me and I said yes. After planting and looking over both planter boxes, I'm thinking that I probably had too many onions before I took the excess, but . . . oh well, we can always use more onions. The Basil is loving the warm weather and the carrots have yet to make and appearance but I'm keeping my eye out.

First bloom!

The Columbine I planted last year (that I had thought had died about 2 weeks after I planted it and I basically forgot to remove what I thought were the dead roots) is thriving this year! It has started to blossom and is producing the most beautiful flowers. They make a nice backdrop for my planter boxes. It just goes to show that something that fails one year can be a huge success the next. I'm hoping that goes for a lot of the things in my garden this year!

Also, the strawberries, Dahlias, and Raspberries are doing quite well and seem to be growing, growing, growing everyday. I swear the Dahlias have doubled in size since I planted them last Tuesday!

Strawberries soaking up the last rays of sunlight . . .

Grow little Dahlias, grow!

Awaiting the raspberries to come . . .

Overall, the garden is coming along nicely and it's only been 3 weeks! I really hope this beautiful weather continues. The sun is a garden's best friend.

Cheers (and enjoy the sunshine!),

- c

The Dahlia Dilemma and Some Sprouts!

Where will we go?

This flat of poor Dahlias and Snapdragons have been patiently waiting for me to find a spot for them to live (at least for the season). Since they've been sitting there for about 2 weeks, I finally decided now was as good a time as any to get them in the ground.

I decided they would go in the bed on the side of our yard. But first, some maintenance was needed:

Side bed - before

There was plenty of weeds that needed to be removed, as well as some ivy that was making its way over from the neighbor's yard. You never know what you're going to find when you dig in the dirt:

Missing something?

I was a little leery pulling that thing up. I could only see the tip of the handle peeking out and I had no idea how big it was or even what it was. Turned out to be an innocent (though well-rusted) pair of pliers, but it could have been anything - including a cast iron pan, which we have found in the garden before! I wonder what the people who lived here before were thinking? Did they just bury unnecessary objects in the ground? I'm a little nervous about what else I might find!

After about an hour of work (and disturbing several earthworms and other various garden residents), the side bed was ready for planting:

Side bed - after

I planted the 6 Dahlias on the left side of the rocks and 3 of the Snapdragons to the right. The other 3 Snapdragons have found a new home at the front of the house, near the front door (I'll try to get a picture of the front yard plants later this week). I'm hoping they grow and bloom into some beautiful summer flowers!

In other garden related news - some seeds have sprouted in Planter Box #1!

Someday we will be spinach!

In a perfect little row, right where I planted the spinach seeds, some sprouts have appeared! Yay! I'm pretty excited and finally have some proof that those itsy-bitsy seeds are actually doing their thing underground. I'm hoping for lots of big salads later in the summer!

I continue to be grateful for the milder and warmer weather and hope that the sun keeps shining down on my (soon-to-be) beautiful garden!

Cheers!

- c