Half-way done...

So the paper sack condos are looking good!



Here's the tomatos... haven't done the cherry tomatoes yet. I'm thinking I'm going to only do half of what I've got on them, they are said to produce A LOT!



Here's the corn and squash. I think there might even be an okra or two in there. They all seem to be liking their new home!



Apparently another sunflower has peeked his head above ground in here. I think I should find a new place for these guys and get them out of the garlic pot lol.

I've still got a ton more to do, and there are some seedlings that aren't ready to be moved yet (according to my expert opinion yanno) so I've got some time.

I did get the sweater rack out of the garage and that's what the tomatoes are sitting on now. I put it right in front of the slider door to give them whatever light the March sun has to offer. I'm kinda concerned though, I don't want them to get too dang big before mid-April when they get to move into their mansion in the backyard. That's still more than a month away.

Mooooovin on Up!

In the process of moving my seedlings from their pellet apartments to their newspaper and paper sack condos. This is definitely a chore. We bought some gardening mix and regular soil in bags and I'm mixing them 1:2. Hopefully they will still stay healthy and continue to grow.

Every day something else has sprouted or grown beyond it's little pellet. I'll take some pics when I have everything in order and add them later. I'm getting this metal rack that I used to store my sweaters and such on in the apt and moving that to the kitchen. That should allow me some more room to keep my babies without intruding on the already over-planted greenhouse look-a-like kitchen I've got going now. We are having a hard time finding a spot at the kitchen table to eat supper lol!

Got confirmation on the poop load too. It's apparently cow manure, and from what I've read, it's best to add that to the garden in the fall because of the nitrogen. I also read that we should get the "old poop" and that if I mix it in the bed, make sure to wait at least 2-3 weeks prior to planting. If we gets the beds together this weekend, I'll have plenty of time. Can't put anything outside until after April 15 anyway (lol if I can wait that long being the nonconformist that I am) so hopefully the timing won't be an issue. I'll just have to make sure we don't go crazy with the poop.

The only thing that really hasn't sprouted yet is the second round of green beans that I've started, but they've still got a few days yet before I expect to see anything. I'll panic later lol.

This weekend is supposed to be beautiful, so hopefully we'll be able to get the beds together and I'll feel like we are really moving forward!

HOLY COW POOP!

I never, in my wildest dreams (and I've had some doozies), thought I'd be excited at the thought of Andy going to pick up a truckload of cow poop. Apparently, he works with a lady who said if he drove to her land, he could have all the poop he wanted. How thoughtful LOL!

And... my latest sprouts this morning are the zucchini, yellow squash, green beans and radishes. A couple more big beefs (next time I'll pick a different tomato) have sprouted as well too. It's like overnight they all just decide "Ok my turn!" LOL. The babies are poking their heads out of their little pellet homes as we speak. I'll get some pics when they are a little further out. Awww, my babies are coming alive! I'm so proud! I was worried about the bush beans. I think a few of the seeds rotted so I'm sure I lost a few of those. A positive note on that though is that I planted way too many for the first "session", so I'll start more of those in another week, and then again in 2 more weeks. I should have a steady flow of bush beans during harvest time.

Tuesday Update!

Well, we decided to hold off for a week on getting the beds built b/c of the freeze last weekend. Not that I thought it would have anything to do with the top-soil, b/c it's supposed to be screened and all that jazz... mostly because we didn't want to go outside and freeze our butts off. So the plan is set for this weekend to buy a ton of top-soil, get the beds on the ground and fill them!

In the meantime, my babies in the house have just been growing and growing!

The demon corn has sprouted roots out the bottom of my pellets. I'm afraid I'm going to have to replant them in something bigger prior to moving them outside. I'm thinking about doing the newspaper rolls I read about so I can keep them pretty contained until it's warm enough to get them in their permanent home.



Then we've got the brussel sprouts that I've been thinning to try and keep them in order. I don't think they are going to do very well in a spring/summer crop because of our weather here, but I'm giving it a try. If it doesn't work, I've still got the winter crop to work with.

The tomatoes are doing well still too. I've moved a few of the cherry tomatoes to another butter tub so they have a bit more room. I have no idea what to do with the rest other newspaper roll them when they get too big for their peat pellets.



Then we have the garlic with the sunflower in the middle. The sunflower is creepy looking, and I'm going to have to move him again, but I needed a place to stick him for the moment. I can smell the garlic YUM!



So far, the biggest mistake that I can see that I've made is planting too many seeds per pellet. I just didn't think that all of those little boogers were actually going to sprout! So now I've got to kill my babies and thin them. I guess it's better to have too many rather than too few... or none at all. Lesson learned!

Plans Have Changed ~

So we were putting together some costs for this weekends project of getting the beds together.

If we get the rototiller, that's $45 flat for the day. Then we have to buy top soil to mix in with the stuff that was rototilled... and that's about $6-$7 a bag. For three 5 x 10 beds, I'm thinking we are going to need a lot of bags. Or we can buy a ton of dirt for $45 that's been screened and mixed with a fertilizer, but with the rototilled dirt and a ton of dirt... that's way too much dirt for those beds... and I don't want a pile of dirt just laying around in my backyard. Out of the 4 kids, I'm sure 3 of them would try to bury the 4th one and that would just be all bad. This way I'm looking at $90 to get the beds ready.

So here's my though... why til at all? According to Bartholemew, the SFG God, we can use 6" of soil (of course, his special mix is what he recommends) in the beds and grow what we like without messing with the rototiller. So $45 for the ton of top-soil and then assemble the beds. I think one ton will do the trick and I can fill the beds 8 inches with that (if I did my gutinzas right --- goes-in-tas --- Beverly Hillbilly terminology for ya right there!) and I'll be done at half the cost and 3/4 less manual labor for Andy. I might help put the beds together, but you won't find me anywhere near the scene when he's got to wheelbarrow dirt from the truck to the backyard lol. I'll have some family emergency that I'll have to tend to, or sprain my ankle, or be in the middle of dying my hair or something... but I won't be out there!

According to my google calculations on tons to cubic feet to cubic yards... I'm going to need 0.33 ton of top-soil for each bed. Fancy that, I have 3 beds! So exactly a ton should fill my 5 x 10 beds 8" deep with top-soil. If not, I'll buy more. I still can't believe it's only $45 actually. I wonder if there's a catch in there somewhere that I don't know about.

So, that leaves me an extra $45 (from the rototiller that we aren't going to rent now) to get more garden stuff lol. Woo hoo! This next trip to Lowe's is already going to cost a fortune. We've got to buy a wheelbarrow, shovel, rake, sheers, a hose, and whatever other fancy gadgets I can find that I can't live without. Being that we just moved from an apt to a house, we don't already have this stuff. I'm probably going to get more peat pellets, but this time I'll just get the pellets b/c I already have the trays. Believe me, I've been looking on Craigslist for stuff too and I'm just not finding anything.

That reminds me... I need to call on that wheelbarrow I found yesterday!

More later...

Pics of my peats

Here's one of the 16-pellet trays that seems to be doing very well. It amazes me how much growth there is from one day to the next. That messy ole 72-pellet tray in the in the background... I hope it survives :(

There's my garlic sprout. There are 4 of them so far. I'm like a new mommy. I love this game!

Peat or Pete? That is the question...

Last night I put all three peat pellet trays on the stove, and the 72-pellet tray closest to the little fluorescent light on the back panel. No more moldly looking junk, but for Pete's sake, still no sprouting. The other little guys in the 16-pellet trays look healthy and growing right along. Their little sprouts moved toward the light overnight, like they were all raising their hands at a concert, it was cute.

So I rotated them and I'm waiting until the sun heats up the yard a little more before I move them closer to the slider door. I might even sneak them outside for a bit, especially that 72-pellet one to dry it up a little bit. I'm going to get that diluted peroxide spray bottle ready just in case...