Spring Harvest

I had this afternoon off, so I spent it in the garden. We've been really rainy the last few days, so everything out there is blooming and growing very quickly. I brought in our biggest harvest so far this year - some green beans, peas, strawberries and our first pepper. (The beer was for hydration).

Overall, the garden has been fantastic this year. It's been a warm, sunny spring with lots of rain, and on by my third time around I had learned a lot about planting in a small space. I couldn't be happier with the results. We're eating lots of strawberries (I'm beginning to freeze some of them), and we've had lots of onions and lettuce so far.

Our tomatoes and peppers are covered in flowers and buds, so those should be good for eating very soon. Our beets and carrots are also getting close. As far as the potatoes go, I have no clue how to tell if they're ready. I'll have to figure that one out . . . . 

The flower gardens are also filling in. This one in the backyard was planted last summer, but we rearranged it this summer to add a weeping cherry tree. If you squint you might be able to see it. Someday it will provide great shade and privacy. 

This is the bed I planted along the side of our porch earlier this year (shown here). It's quickly filling in and is currently bright with lily blooms. 

And here are a few more garden shots, just for the fun of it. Can you find the ant?

Spring Growth

Spring has arrived in Jonesville, and our outdoor activities are in full bloom.

Becca is growing lettuce in the garden with great success.

Our climatis flowers are blooming and bigger than ever.

We bought a Japanese Maple tree via mail order for our neighbor.

Becca really likes to plant trees.

Strawberries are also coming in. This year should be a great harvest, now that the squirrel cage is up.

Wrigley still likes to fetch, probably more than anything else.

Becca's new roses are looking great in their second year of growth.

Wrigley approves of the garden but wishes we grew bacon.

Garden Views

Tomato plants sprouting in the basement.

We've reached the time of year when things around the garden look different every week. Here are this week's views.

Convenient new spicket, installed by my handy dad and obliging husband. Will make it much easier to maintain our garden this year.

First anemone bloom. Love these little guys.

 Lettuce buds popping up like crazy.

 Lots of onion stems - the other thing blooming out back. Hopefully there will be lots of great things happening soon, but for now it's onions and lettuce.

 Growing, blooming vinca and clematis filling in the trellises.

    

Hens keeping the chicks company. And the logs. This little guy popped up more than a foot from the rest, between two railroad ties on our steps. And I love him. 

Firmly Planted

 

We are planted!  Well, mostly. Everything is in the ground except the potatoes and beans, which go in in April. Actually I got overly excited and accidentally planted the beans. We're pretty warm so maybe they'll be ok, but if not I'll replant them in April. 

Today was the first work day  post-daylight savings, and it was wonderful to come home to a warm sunny afternoon and have time to get some things done. I had turned all of the soil over during the weekend and even got my markers laid out, so today was all about the seeds.

Above is the garden from the north end, and below is from the south. It may not look like much now but in a few weeks we should see some life. Now, look closely in the strawberry bed. 

Do you see him? Nino really gets sad when I'm outside gardening and Wrigley gets to play, so Chris had the idea to put him in the enclosed strawberry bed. He loved it! He chewed up all the walnut tree twigs for me. Don't worry, I watched him closely to make sure he didn't try to help fertilize, and we won't put him in there once the plants start to blossom. Ok, disclaimer over. Isn't he cute? 



Zooming in on the north end, you can see that the vinca I planted last summer is taking over the ground nicely.

And don't worry about the dead stuff on the trellis. That's clematis, which is just beginning to sprout. It's one of the few perennials that should not be cut back in the winter, because the new growth actually comes from last year's dead stuff. Pretty cool. 

Finally, the other set of seeds. On Saturday I planted tomatoes, grape tomatoes, bell peppers and jalapenos in these starter cups. I have the grow light on a timer in the basement window and mist them daily, so they should be sprouting soon. 

Here's a close-up of day three. Hopefully we'll begin seeing green soon! 

Greening Up

We spent the morning going through the local nursery, and I'm feeling especially inspired for the summer ahead. In addition to our regular vegetable garden, I have some big flowerbed plans for this year. A nursery employee walked around with us this morning and helped me sort through some ideas. Long story short, there are exciting things ahead. Here's some eye candy.

 

Most of my planting so far has been perennials - flowers that die down each winter but come back in the spring. I love them and the life they give our yard through the growing season. This year, though, I'm going big. This means shrubs that will give shape all year long, and yes even another tree. It's exciting stuff.

Not that things aren't already happening. Due to the warm winter we've experienced here in KC, my spring bulbs are about a month ahead of their usual spring schedule. And I love it. It's nice to start seeing some life after a very grey and brown season. So far we've seen lots of crocuses and some daffodil buds.

 

  

Also, we came to the realization this winter that when we purchased our eight boxwoods for out front our first spring in the house, we must have accidentally purchased seven of one kind and one of a different kind. (Can you find the odd one out?)

We described the issue at the nursery today (it grows out rather than up and has a slightly more purple color to its leaves) and the nursery employee confirmed our suspicions. So, we'll be replacing the "one-of-these-things-is-not-like-the-others" shrub this summer. Maybe our little odd guy out will become part of our newly expanded garden areas after we plant his replacement.

Garden Dreaming

Any of you in the midwest know as well as we do that this has been a weird winter, if you can even call it winter. Chris and I took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather and did yard work over the weekend, and it got me into my usual springtime garden fever. I'm ready to plant.

So I spent an afternoon preparing my planting list, and mapping out my beds, with much help from Burpee seeds and the Farmer's Almanac. Planting will officially begin in the Jones home on March 1 when lettuce seeds go down outside.

But before I get into my plans, here are some ghosts of garden past to help you get as excited as I am about this:

Grape and roma tomatoes

Peppers!

Mammoth sunflower before

And after. See the boxelder bug enjoying the view?

First year in our garden. I overplanted a little.

And the ever-growing rosemary.

This year's planting will look like this:

Bed 1: Strawberries. (as always)

Bed 2: Tomatoes, grape tomatoes, bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, onions. Basically it's a salsa garden.

Bed 3: Lettuce, spinach and potatoes. The potatoes are new, but I hear they're easy to grow and extra delicious when fresh. I might try out a unique variety, like purple potatoes.

Bed 4: Beans, beats and carrots. Basically beets and friends, because wow do I love beets. I've even convinced Chris that they're worth eating. And I might throw in a few ears of corn, even though Chris told me I wasn't allowed. Just think, trying to keep this Iowa native from growing a few ears of sweet corn . . . . don't tell him.

In addition, we'll have a planter of mint, one of basil, one of rosemary (our rosemary plants from last year have actually survived the winter, so this one is good to go!), one of peas (this is new - I found a compact variety of pea plant that's perfect for small spaces) and one of parsley, oregano and sage. Each garden bed will hold marigolds to keep the critters away, and I'll have a few varieties of sunflowers - including the huge ones, of course - along the flower beds outside the garden retaining wall.

So that's it, we're on official countdown to seed day - only 10 days! I can't wait.