I love gardens. I love plants, I love flowers, I love vegetables. The only problem is, I can’t seem to get plants, flowers, or vegetables to want to be around me for very long. That’s why it’s so surprising I have 5 or 6 herbs in front of my kitchen window right now – just hanging out, having fun, and just generally wanting to be around me!
This new development has inspired me to expand my little garden to include lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and some basil from seed. (I usually by basil in plant form, but I thought I could spend $1 on a packet of seeds and see if I avoid spending $9 in plants when the summer comes.) So, the plan was to spend little, gain veggies, and feel one with the earth. Or at least the earth that now resides inside my flowerpots. I have decided to chronicle my project so I can remember what I did next week or next year.
I started out with some good music.
Bound to put me in the spring/summer is here mood.
Next I combined my seed starting mix with some cheaper topsoil.
I wanted to give myself as many breaks as possible, but I couldn’t bring myself to buy enough pricey seed starter for all my seeds.
One $2 bag of name brand topsoil (to avoid to much sand) stretched the good stuff enough to plant all my seeds and have some leftover.
I mixed it up in the wheelbarrow and filled my jiffy seed starting pod-thingys.
The package says to put the pods on a special mat (ha) so I put mine on some leftover tiles.
I planted red cherry tomatoes and jelly bean hybrid, but I had so many red cherry seeds that I ended up planting an extra pot of that kind.
Lettuce seeds next: salad bowl and then a mixed variety – which I am excited about. The package looked like spring mix. I had leftover seeds from the mix, too, so I planted those in spare bowls. (I am pretty sure it’s late to plant lettuce, but the mix looked so awesome and made me want salad so badly. The only experience I have with lettuce growing was when we lived in KY for a summer, and it is much cooler there. Oh well. We’ll see how this goes.)
Then I realized I still had basil to plant and no jiffy pods left. Rats. Maybe I went a little overboard on the seeds. I decided to plant the basil straight in the pot and bring it inside for the seeds to germinate.
At this point it was time to switch to The Black Keys newest record. So to the tune of …my next girl will be nothing like my ex girl….I pressed the seeds down. Then covered them with a new layer of soil.
This is the point when I should have watered, but I forgot that and had to water when they were inside.
I used a kitchen knife to strip the bark off some sticks and labeled them with a sharpie to make markers for the seeds.
Then I brought them inside.
Hooray! That was fun. Here’s hoping these veggies want to hang around.
