The snow finally disappeared on the weekend. Yesterday morning actually. I checked my raised beds. Still frozen under the mulch. Guess I should pull it back to expose the soil. I’m anxious to get growing!
I bought a row cover and some wire to bend into a frame to support it, but I couldn’t get that wire down through the rock hard ground if I tried! I’m thinking setting up the row cover support system should have been a fall project. 
I’m shocked that most of the branches from the tree fit into the bed! I added a layer of leaves and food scraps and hopefully this will settle so I can add another layer of leaves then the soil! It’s coming along.
I’ve been watching Seed and Sparrow homestead on YouTube and she grows so many flowers, it’s inspiring me to want to grow a ton too! She has a majorly impressive garden!
How’s everyone doing? I’m finally back from being sick…I hope for good. It’s a bright, sunshiny day. So I got up and dressed this morning. Hubby and I checked out our garden.
The ground is still frozen beneath our leaf mulch in this zone 5B garden. So we pulled the mulch off where I want to plant peas. Hopefully this next week or so of higher temperatures will thaw the ground enough we can plant. Might not be able to until April, but we’ll see. Microclimate is everything on our hillside garden.
Aside from that, I checked the seedling tray I planted. It looks like the shallot and bunching onion seeds are kaput. I’m not surprised, as they’re 3-4 years old. I keep them in the fridge, but still…some seeds just keep better than others. No bell peppers came up either. But jalapeños have sprouted. Also leeks and parsley.
I planted German Thyme just the other day. A very tiny seed. We’ll see what happens there. I think I’ll put off other planting for another week or so.
Hubby and I were talking about transforming a slope on the south side of the house again. We have about 6-8’ of property there before we run into the neighbour’s yard. It’s a steep slope with river rock on it currently. Unfortunately it’s hard to maintain because weeds grow in it. We were sold it based on its “low maintenance”.
We’re thinking a two tiered retaining wall garden. We could grow melons, eggplant, grapes…whatever likes a hot wall to grow on. Though Hubby wants to have the house re-sided first. Hmmm…that moves the project to next year. This year’s house/yard project has already been decided. It has to be done before the re-siding. I’m waiting on Hubby to phone contractors.
But I’m looking forward to gardening. How’s everyone else doing?
You have some awesome plans!
It’s blizzarding here. I have seeds started but most of the outside work is not going to happen for a while yet.
Thank-you!
I was out in the yard again this afternoon on my own, while Hubby was on his walk. I wanted to:
I found the shed a lot neater than I expected…which is good. I was able to find some things, at least.
I saw at least one box of canning jars on the table. There might be another box under the pile of stuff Hubby left there last fall…i’m not sure.
I took photos of all the pots in the yard and the shed, so I could assess them from the comfort of indoors later.
And, as far as I can tell (Hubby has all kinds of stuff ringing the shed hiding stuff behind stuff), there is no 3/4” plywood or significant amount of lumber to replace the ramp to the shed door. It’s a small ramp…maybe 3’ to 4’ wide by 2-3’ in length. But it’s rotten. Someone is going get caught in it, fall, and hurt themselves.
After all that, I came indoors and rearranged the canning cupboards. (I really am feeling better!). I managed to clear Hubby’s work table of boxes of canning jars. When we buy the new canning pantry, I hope to move the electric food mill off his table too. That will give him a clear workspace again.
My goal is really to get more organized this year with gardening. It’s spread all over the house and the shed. I’m hoping organizing it will make it easier to find things and therefore more time efficient.
Everything I planted germinated!! Yahoooo!
A few questions:
I’m going to do another round of seedlings in a week or two for everything that was 4-6 weeks from last frost. I have another type of tomatoes I want to try, do you think that’s too late (seed packet says 8-10)? I could do a small tray of just the tomatoes and add the others later but I was hoping to do it all at once.
Thanks for letting me ask alllll of the questions. I will do some research too, so if anyone has good links or resources or books they recommend please let me know!
I don’t know about the snapdragons or petunias, I’ve never started those inside.
For tomatoes, I would start those now and add the others later. I think you have a short growing season, as I do, and so if you wait until 4-6 weeks before last frost, they wouldn’t have much time to get going.
Excellent! 
Ditto everything @hollaynia said.
Also, check out Veseys Seeds videos on YouTube. Lots of short videos on starting seeds. Based in PEI, Canada. But the process is the same.
omg almost everything i started last weekend has germinated! so i took the plastic wrap off and will ask husband to turn off the heat mat. or maybe i’ll just move them out to the lil greenhouse tomorrow when god willing the roof work will be done and we can put things back where they go.
my ranunculus corms are doing ok — one even has a little green on it! but i’ll give them another week or so to sprout before i plant them up in pots outside.
Does anyone have a plant identification app they like? There is something popping up that looks and smells like mint but I want to be sure!
Google lens can handle most normal stuff pretty well.
I like Seek because it uses your city and is helpful with identifying native species, but I also use Google lens a lot
I don’t have an app, but anything in the mint family has a square stem.
I use iNaturalist!
I use PlantNet
I was using PlantNet but have switched to Google Lens.
