What a bizarre day. First it snowed, then it hailed, and then the sun shone. I planned on putting together my garden but was put off by the weather. Fortunately, by the time I got home the snow/hail stopped and the sun came out for a bit. I decided to go ahead with the garden work. Unfortunately, I realized that there is somewhat limited sun on part of the terrace/patio because of a high hedge and shrubs nearby so I had to figure out a way around it. After much debate and negotiation with Mom (not to mention brief discussions of how the sun works, aerodynamics, and nuclear physics), she finally let me sacrifice a teeny part of her landscape (a little shrub bed beside the terrace) that I am converting to a bed for my veggie garden. Unfortunately, there was a HUGE flowering shrub there that had to go. It was pretty quick work to chop down the branches with a hand saw but the roots are going to be a PITA to get rid of. I spent several hours with a spade and a pickaxe and managed to do some damage to it but the stump is still there And now my back is killing me but it will be worth it. I’ll be able to convert most of the terrace and the whole shrub garden into a raised veggie patch. I also added some posts to hang my topsy turvy strawberry planters off the deck and I nailed together my two 4 foot square veggie gardens using 1 x 6 wood (4 ft long, obviously). I have the landscape cloth to put under it so there won’t be any weeds growing up or nasty stuff leaching through from underneath. I’m going to use the rubbermaid bins for stuff that requires roots and more depth, like the garlic, onions, and potatoes I’ve already planted and the tomatoes, carrots, etc. that I plan on planting.

Oh, I also grabbed a bunch of worms from the garden (whilst singing “I touched a worm and I liked it”) and added them to the compost bin. We’ll see if they earn their keep in there, but they should be happy–it’s like an all-you-can-eat schmorgasbord in there. Fortunately, it smells pretty darn good too because of a bit of lemon and lime peels in there. Very citrusy. I added more Rot-it and turned it all before adding the worms so hopefully that will help it break down faster.

All right, that’s all for now. Zoë needs some quality snuggle time before dinner

Well, I haven’t been doing much cooking lately as I’ve been a bit under the weather and just haven’t had the energy. But I did dabble a wee bit in the “garden” today. Well, mostly at the gardening stores. First, I went to Home Depot and picked up some more seeds (chili pepper, corn, and snow pea) and some bulbs (garlic and yellow onion), along with 2 cheap wooden trellises for the Rubbermaid Tomato and Pepper gardens. Oh, and a book on growing organic veggies/fruit/flowers. I also got a few small things like labels and tomato ties. Then I went to Canadian Tire and got 2 Topsy Turvy Strawberry Planters (anybody familiar with these? Are they any good?), a big bag of compost soil, some anti-weed felt or whatever it’s called (to be the base of my vegetable garden bed), and some peat pots. I’m going to build my own raised vegetable garden on the terrace using the weed felt, some wood (or perhaps some cement mason bricks), and soil. I’m not that handy but surely I could nail/screw 4 planks of wood together or stick some bricks in a square and fill it with soil.

I just planted the onion and garlic bulbs in my 2 cedar planters (rectangular, narrow-ish planters with a plastic liner filled with potting mix). I also pulled out the onions and romaine lettuce from my aerogarden; putting onions in there was a stupid idea to begin with (what was I thinking?) and the romaine was getting big enough to transplant to a larger container, so I just stuck it in a styrofoam cup (we already had them so I was repurposing them) and filled it with some vermiculite and inserted the grow pod (sans plastic). As long as it survives that, I’ll transplant it outside at a later date (probably will move it over to a peat pot first). My cucumber plant is doing really, really well in the AG. It’s grown 1 big true leaf and the second one is rapidly growing. Eventually, I plan on transplanting it outdoors as well but I’m not in a rush to kick that one out of the nest quite yet Unfortunately, my second Ruby Heirloom Tomato kit isn’t really doing anything (yet) but hopefully those seeds will germinate soon *fingers crossed* My next new obsession is canning and preserving food but that can wait until I actually have something to preserve. And yes, I still want chickens dammit. I was looking at suburban farm land in Ontario on the MLS site for fun. If you go north enough (an hour or two outside Toronto), you can get some huge acreage and a decent house with a barn for cheap (less than a shitty, leaky condo costs here in Victoria). It’s a fun little pipe dream. I’m also really enjoying reading the blog at www.urbanhomestead.org. They really seem to be making it work on less than 1/4 acre of land in California! Very cool. Oh, and here are a couple really neat blogs/sites on canning and food preserving:

Food in Jars

Canning Across America

Consider the Pantry

And a really great YouTube account: Wolfcrik (by “Granny Miller”)

EDIT: I’m also going to start adding my veggie gardening/homesteading/etc. links here:

In My Kitchen Garden

5 Acres and a Dream (sounds like my dream!)

Suburban Homesteading

Enjoy!

It looks like it’s going to be a nice, sunny day today. Of course, here on the island the weather can change rather suddenly so who knows how long it will last! I took some pictures to show how my little seedlings are doing:

You can see my cucumber seedling that appeared out of nowhere. It looks MUCH healthier and happier than my seedling planted in dirt.

Closeup of cucumber seedling, compared to my dirt-planted ones:

They look much more leggy and spindly and aren’t nearly as green as the aerogarden seedling.

This is my tiny peat-pod greenhouse with Romaine Lettuce, Fox Cherry Tomatoes, Martian Giant Tomatoes, Danvers Carrots and (Sweet) Bell Peppers. I’ve planted a lot of peppers but I have never had much luck raising them from seedlings and even getting them to sprout, so I thought I would plant a bunch and see how they do.

This is the mini-greenhouse sitting on my desk under a full-spectrum lamp and regular desk lamp. It’s been grey and rainy the past few days and the first seedlings were really leggy so I moved it to my room and put it under the lamps and it seems to be doing much better (though still a bit spindly). I over planted the seeds a bit and I started culling some of the seedlings yesterday, snipping off the first ones that were really leggy. I’ll have to snip some more today or tomorrow once I see how the “younger” seedlings are doing.

My beets starting to peek through the soil. I just love that red colour!

And finally, a requisite shot of my sleepy pup Zoë.

TTFN!

D-

I temporarily took out the 4 spacers on my Aerogarden (between the Ruby Heirloom Tomatoes) and used my Master Gardener Kit to start germinating some seeds, which I will remove and plant in dirt once the tomatoes (hopefully) start growing and taking over. I added some eggplant, romaine lettuce, onion, and cucumber. Here is a pic of the Aerogarden in the corner of the dining room:

I also have an avocado pit in water and a ziplock with 3 lemon seeds in paper towel (just for some fun plants to grow, not really expecting anything from them).

And a pic of the “mini greenhouse” sitting on the cat’s condo in the dining room window:

And finally, a pic of my mini-orange (calamondin) tree, with lots of blooms and buds:

And that’s all for now

UPDATE: OMG, my salad mix seeds in the mini greenhouse are already sprouting!!!

UPDATE 2: Just realized that my lights are too high on the Aerogarden, didn’t realize I could lower them more duh! I also moved my mini greenhouse into the bedroom under my full-spectrum desk lamp because the lettuce is growing too quickly and getting leggy. I also planted a smaller mini-greenhouse with onions, carrots, basil, peppers, and martian giant tomatoes. I hope they grow!