Let's Get Planting!

It's that time of year. The days are slowly getting longer, the sun is peaking out a wee bit more and I feel the bloom of spring just itching to burst forth from the soil *grin*.

I know, it's barely the middle of February and we could get snow and frozen temperatures at any minute but I can't help myself but want to will spring to come now. So to fill the time until it finally does appear I pulled out my box of seed packets to see what I had, what is needed and to sort out all of my tomato seeds because it's time to get planting :)

Our growing season is wet, cool and rather short so anything I can do to help things speed along a little quicker before it's time to get things in the ground outdoors is always welcome. Last summer you probably remember that Hubby built me a little greenhouse and it will be perfect for growing an early crop of tomatoes in. So I pulled out what I had left of my little jiffy seven peat pots and soaked them in some nice hot water to puff them up for planting.

I planted Bonny Best, Italian Paste, German Red Strawberry, Polish Paste, and Rocket so far but I also need to start some Black Krim which is a wonderful meaty heirloom variety that we love for sandwiches.

You can find some of them in my favorite seed catalogues like West Coast Seeds, Seeds of Victoria, Salt Spring Seeds and of course all of the wonderful ones I find every year at the various Seedy Saturdays (click for listings) scattered over the island :)

With my little seeds tucked away in a nice dark spot itching to sprout they will be all ready to harden off in the greenhouse nice and early so we can make the most of this summer. I can't wait!

Hugs,
Rosina

Planting and a Greenhouse Update

We're finally getting down and dirty *grin*.
My oldest and I shoveled all of the rows in the vegetable garden and hauled in manure to dress the beds with. I've been working this spot for nearly 10 years now and the soil is really starting to look super healthy. It was terribly poor sandy soil when we started and everything refused to grow in it but as we turned the soil this year it was loaded with big fat earth worms, was darker and it just looks better so I can't wait to see how everything grows!



I'm trying something new this year and using floating row covers over the newly planted seeds. Last year the birds took a lot of the seed right out of the ground as soon as we planted and I even had my first crop of broccoli stripped of every green leaf and had to start over. So this should keep everything safe!

You should have seen the robins sitting on the fence posts watching us as we put the beans in. You just knew that as soon as you turned your back they were going to swoop in but we quickly covered the bush and pole beans with the cover and foiled their plans *grin*. It's actually keeping the little seedlings warmer to! It's been only two days and they are already starting to sprout and they never germinate that fast.

Oh and check out my greenhouse!!
This is the back wall and it has two giant windows and just a foot and a half of solid wall at the bottom maximizing the early morning sun that comes over the mountain first thing in the morning...

and here is one of the side walls with another big window that will go in. I just love the smell of the cedar and the chunky size of the hand milled lumber that my dad milled :)

Only one more wall to go up in the front which will have two more giant windows and I have an old solid glass door for the front so it is going to be awesome! Oh my I can't wait. It is smoking hot out here all summer so it's going to be perfect :)

It's taking a little longer than I had planned for it to be completed as Hubby comes and goes between work but I've waited years for this to happen and even if I don't get to utilize the full summer growing season I'm going to do some winter crops in it this fall and next spring it'll be ready to go right away. Yay, I can't wait *grin*.

How's your week going? I hope you all are enjoying some sunshine, time outdoors and maybe even some time getting your hands really dirty in the dirt :)

Hugs,
Rosina

We're Planting!

My greenhouse isn't ready yet but I'm still going to get a jump on my tomato plants this year *grin*. After lunch today I rounded up my youngest little helper and we went hunting for the leftover stash of jiffy sevens that I knew I'd tucked away somewhere last spring for safe keeping. You know, one of those super safe places that are so good you don't even remember where it was!

I love these little things :)

You drop the little discs of compressed soil into a little bit of hot water and they magically puff right up providing a lovely warm home for your new seeds.

My five year old is growing by leaps and bounds and becoming such a great little helper that this year I let him do all of the planting on his own. With supervision of course :)

He carefully opened up the top of each of the jiffy sevens and placed three tomato seeds onto the soil and covered them up very gently. I like to plant in groupings of three. That way if any of them die or don't come up then I've got backups!

I planted 9 seeds for each type of tomato and if all goes well I should have 54 tomato plants all together. Most likely I'll loose a few due to poor germination but this will provide a substantial amount of tomatoes compared to the few I did last year. I've got great plans of canning stewed tomatoes and tomato sauce again this year. Normally I just purchase cases of field tomatoes from local farmers for this task but I really want to use my own. They just taste oh so much better *grin*.

I tried to find varieties that were well suited to growing here on the coast or for canning purposes so I went with:

Bonny Best: a strong indeterminate plant with excellent flavor. Especially good for colder climates.

Rocket: medium sized fruit, fast maturing and grow well in the short season of the coastal BC and prairies.

Italian Heritage Roma: abundant harvest of thick walled tomatoes with few seeds, perfect for tomato sauce and paste.

Lisa King: large red beefsteak, good flavor and very productive. This was highly recommended.

Polish Paste: flavorful and meaty, good for tomato pastes.

German Red Strawberry: large 1lb fruits, good producer and canning tomato.

They're all organic, non gmo and some are heirloom varieties so I'm hoping to have a great crop :) If not I'll cull the ones we don't like and pick new ones next year *grin*.

Can't wait until they start to sprout out of the dirt!

Hugs,
Rosina

Welcome To Our Garden

Remember those cute gumboots we were planting flowers in?
I thought that the perfect place to put them would be to hang them right on our garden gate *grin*. Don't they look super cute there? A perfect flower filled welcome to our vegetable garden and the kids just love seeing them every time we go to water or plant. Plus this way the slugs will never be able to eat the blooms either!

Hubby returned home this morning after 2 weeks away for work and we are overjoyed to have him with us again. So if I'm just a little bit scarce the next couple of days you'll know what has happened to me :)

** Just wanted to add a note and say hello to all of you visiting my blog today :) I've had quite a few emails about how I hung the boots and if they have any drainage so I thought this would be a great place to put some more info in case you would like to know to :)

There are drainage holes in each of the boots so that excess water can escape after watering. I used my husband's power drill and drilled four or five 1/4 inch holes through the soles and then for hanging the boots I drilled another hole on the backside of the boot up at the top and hung them on the fence using those little cup hooks you can get anywhere they sell screws :) If you can't find the little cup hooks you could also use a regular nail and just hammer the end crooked so it turns up a bit on the end to prevent the boot from slipping off. Have fun making some! **

Have a fabulous week everyone!
~ Rosina

Seed Tape Update

Okay so I told you I'd update you on how the seed tape making was coming along and it is working fabulously!!

It didn't stick to the table like I had feared with all of the wet newspaper and the seeds stayed put *grin*. So tonight we started another batch and I came up with a genius way to get the flour paste on! Instead of brushing it on with a paintbrush which was a little tedious as the paste is so sticky and doesn't spread especially well we used a squeeze bottle.

I had an old bottle that we used to take camping for putting ketchup in that hadn't made it into the junk box yet and I thought that I would just see if I could get the paste to squeeze smoothly through the spout. I made the flour and water paste the same as yesterday, the consistency of pancake batter making sure that I got as many of the lumps whipped out as I could and it flowed through the tip perfectly.

What a time saver!! Now we can just whip a strip of paste down the strips of newspaper in mere seconds and sprinkle seeds to our hearts content *grin*. We're heading out rain or shine tomorrow to start planting them in the garden :)

How about you, what are you up to in your garden right now?
~ Rosina

Making Seed Tape

I don't know about you but it seems that every year when little hands help plant the vegetable garden there is an inevitable spillage of seeds. Most of the time it's the carrots... those teeny tiny seeds you can barely see once they hit the dirt. There's not much you can do once it happens but wait for a rogue patch of Nantes to poke up in the middle of a pathway somewhere *grin*.

This year we're going to experiment and make our own seed tape :) I ran across a blog post somewhere out there in bloggy land (sorry can't remember which one) where they made a paste of flour and water to *glue* the seeds to newsprint on little dots of paste.
So we got out some newspaper and using my Fiskars cutter K sliced one inch strips of paper that we spread out all over the kitchen table.

For the glue we mixed 1/2 a cup of flour and water together. I don't have an exact measurement for the water but I just dribbled in water and mixed until it was a nice sloppy consistency similar to pancake batter. How's that for mental imagery! *grin*.

To spread the paste we used a large paintbrush and rubbed the paste down the lengths of newspaper making a thick layer of it down the center and then placed the seeds on top of the paste. So far we've just done some of the beet seeds as a trial run. I didn't want to do to many just in case something horrible happens like the newsprint glues itself to the table or all of the seeds end up falling off *grin*.

They're still wet so I'll have to update you again tomorrow on how they turn out and if all goes well we're going to have these great strips of seeds to just lay on our rows for planting in the vegetable garden! Can't wait to update you on how it works out :)

~ Rosina

Itching To Plant

I've been feeling a little bit under the weather the last couple of days so I apologize for the lack of blogging. I've been hitting my pillow pretty early and it's been cutting into my blogging time as I usually post in the wee hours of the morning *grin*.

I'm super excited as my garden got a final rototilling today and now I can get out there and start shoveling the rows for planting! We got hit by frost the other morning and it damaged some of the young trees so I'm definitely going to wait until closer to the May long weekend before really setting any of the warmer crops into the ground as we should be safe from any cold weather by then :)

Remember my poor broccoli & cauliflower that was completely eaten by the sparrows? Well I had left it in the ground with the slight glimmer of hope that it may recover and low and behold there are actually some little green leaves starting to come out of the center of them!! They look absolutely horrendous still but they just might make it after all *grin*.

Well I better go :) I've got a new copy of the Old Schoolhouse Magazine that came in the mail today and I think I'm going to curl up in bed and read a bit before snoring LOL. I'm hoping to do some blog hopping tomorrow and catch up on my nature buddy blogs and maybe share some pictures of L's dress as it's getting closer to being finished :)

~ Rosina

Veggie Planting ~ Outdoor Challenge Day 13

Boy are we lucky!! The rain managed to hold off and it was just a gloomy day but it gave us a chance to get our cold tolerant vegetables planted :)

Before we could get started we needed to head over to the manure pile and load up. I think that wheelbarrow rides are M's new favorite mode of transportation *grin*.

Look at all that wonderful horse manure. Super food for growing great vegetables!

You know you've got some pretty healthy soil if there are lots of earthworms wriggling around when you start digging and we found quite a few of them :) We usually plant flowers in this bed but thought that we would maximize our vegetable space and fill it up with things we could eat! LOL.

As K dug holes for our broccoli, cauliflower and cabbage I filled up a gallon sized pot full of manure and then M & L would dump it into an empty hole. We had quite the efficient assembly line of digging and dumping going on!

Broccoli and cauliflower love lime so each hole got a big scoop of lime that was mixed in with the manure before the plant was set on top of it.

Oh boy are these going to taste good when they're big enough to eat *grin*.

Do you have photos of your children enjoying the outdoors? Visit The Great Outdoors Challenge to join in the fun and you can also visit other participants and see what sort of nature fun they have been having by clicking on the names below :)

~ Rosina

Fellow Nature Players:lisa, sanders, angelina, phyllis, sarah, christie, jennifer, debbie, dong dong, denise, luisa, joy, stephanie, cori, alex, dawn, kristen, catherine, tricia, becky, christy, ruth, kari, courtney, branflakes, jessica, renee, haiku, brynn, amy, clemencia, sherry, leslie, lise, renee, anet, jenn, marina, amy, ella, marcia, karen, beth, julie, kyndale, kelly, lizzie, eileen, ag, mari-ann, cindy, robin, nicole, debbie, julia, anita, lisa, jenn, montessori, marita, jeannie, hallie, mandy, kangaroo, andrea, joey, carmen, teena, stephinie, gidget, elizabeth, emma, rosina, saminda, melissa, katie, becca, atouria, barbara, ariella, missy, elizabeth, sarah, eileen, lisa, stacy, jennifer, tulsileaf, lisa C, morticia, angela, rana, jamie, lisa c, luz, charley, heather, valerie, kirsten, rachel, annie, kendra, beth s, lindsey, michelle, megan, renee

Planting Potatoes ~ Outdoor Challenge Day 10

Well the good weather just keeps on coming :)
It's time to start planting the potatoes and my dad thought that our field would be the best one to plow for planting.

He ran our old 1952 Massey Ferguson with the plow attached to the back and dug a nice channel for planting in and then K went along it after with the shovel and dug in little holes so that they could be filled with manure.

On each little hole of manure L helped Opa cover it with a bit of dirt and then placed one of last years potatoes on top. You can see that they are definitely ready to go into the ground as they are covered in lots of long 'eyes'. Those are the sprouts shooting out of the potatoes :)

Have you ever grown your own potatoes and they have come out scabby when you've dug them up? Well if you used manure to fertilize them and you planted your potato right in the manure this could be the cause. In the past we have done this which resulted in lovely big potatoes but they were always covered in scabs. It won't hurt you but they're not as pretty *grin*. We started covering the manure with a little dusting of dirt before planting the potato on top and we cured the scab problem!

Everyone wanted to help so Opa had a lot of helpers :)
They planted 3 rows and just over 300 potatoes and they're not done yet!! If the weather holds they're going to finish on Saturday and I'll have to get some photos of the tractor in action :)

Do you have photos of your children enjoying the outdoors? Visit The Great Outdoors Challenge to join in the fun and you can also visit other participants and see what sort of nature fun they have been having by clicking on the names below :)

~ Rosina

Fellow Nature Players:lisa, sanders, angelina, phyllis, sarah, christie, jennifer, debbie, dong dong, denise, luisa, joy, stephanie, cori, alex, dawn, kristen, catherine, tricia, becky, christy, ruth, kari, courtney, branflakes, jessica, renee, haiku, brynn, amy, clemencia, sherry, leslie, lise, renee, anet, jenn, marina, amy, ella, marcia, karen, beth, julie, kyndale, kelly, lizzie, eileen, ag, mari-ann, cindy, robin, nicole, debbie, julia, anita, lisa, jenn, montessori, marita, jeannie, hallie, mandy, kangaroo, andrea, joey, carmen, teena, stephinie, gidget, elizabeth, emma, rosina, saminda, melissa, katie, becca, atouria, barbara, ariella, missy, elizabeth, sarah, eileen, lisa, stacy, jennifer, tulsileaf, lisa C, morticia, angela, rana, jamie, lisa c, luz, charley, heather, valerie, kirsten, rachel, annie, kendra, beth s, lindsey, michelle, megan, renee

Seedy Saturday Is Upon Us

1. seedy saturday, 2. Runner beans, 3. Seedy Saturday, 4. packets 1

Okay spring fever has officially hit *grin*. There are seed displays in every garden market, grocery store, hardware shop, dollorama... you name it and they've probably got some. Not to mention the half dozen seed catalogues that have arrived in the last month :)

You can't escape it! Not that I really want to as it's so rewarding to grow your own vegetables but the cost can become astronomical if you don't watch your pocket book. That's where the 'Seedy Saturday' comes in!

Seedy Saturdays are a fantastic way to get heirloom, organic, untreated, non GMO seeds at great prices or for free if you have saved seeds of your own to swap with others :) The wealth of information is unbeatable to! These seeds are tried, true & tested and the guy or gal behind the table can give you the ultimate low down on how to raise up some mighty fine veggies *grin*.

This weekend there are nearly a dozen different swaps that I know of going on across Canada and I'm heading out to one in hopes of finding some new potatoes to plant, a few strawberry runners and whatever else catches my eye :)

Have a peek at the Seeds of Diversity website and see if you are close to one of the many swaps happening this weekend and on through the month. You won't be disappointed and even if you don't buy anything check out some of the seminars they're hosting or pick the brain of your local seed savers chapter and find out how you can hang onto some of your favorite seeds to.

See you out there!
~ Rosina

Gardening Catalogues

We just had to stop and take a photo the other day when we went down island of this great Inukshuk atop the big rock in Campbell River :) Someone was definitely bitten by the spirit of the Olympics *grin*.

Gone is that beautiful blue sky that was in the above photo and it's raining again but I've been cheering myself up with thoughts of planting my garden! I've been ordering from West Coast Seeds out of Delta, BC for quite a few years now and I've got my new 2010 catalogue dog eared already with my new favorites and old faithfuls :)



All of their seeds are untreated & GMO free and there are some new certified organic seeds as well. Quick note though, it appears when you do a quick glance through the first pages that all of their seeds would be organic with all the certified organic stamps and write up flashed but only seeds listings that specifically say they are organic actually are. I was really hoping that all of the seeds were now organic but some is better than none!

If you're in Europe, specifically England I just received a fabulous seed catalogue from a company called Sarah Raven's Kitchen & Garden and it is just chocked full of organic seeds!! So many interesting and very different vegetables to choose from.



I was particularly interested in the organic bean seeds that they have. We live in a colder climate and there is a cool climate pole bean named Borlotti Lingua de Fuocco that can be planted in April which is nearly 2 months ahead of when we can plant our usual bean seeds and another broad bean named Super Aquadulce that can be sown in February or September for a fall/winter crop. Sadly though it appears that they don't ship outside the European union so I guess my crazy winter bean dreams will have to be put on hold LOL.

Do you have a favorite seed company that sells organic seeds in Canada or ships to Canada that you could share?

~ Rosina

Attacking the Weeds

We're starting to get the gardening bug around here. The kids and I decided that we would attack the front flower beds and kick out the lawn that decided to grow in them *grin*. It was definitely no small feat! Who knew3 little helpers wielding mini spades could be so dangerous LOL. There was flying dirt, wiggling worms and some not so lucky grubs that got squished so their guts could be examined :) But we got it done!

Two beautiful beds of freshly turned soil ready for planting. Since we never really get very far in the flower department I think we'll use them for vegetables this year! It might prove to be a very good place to grow a couple of tomatoes since it gets all day sun and is a lovely warm spot.

For now we're going to sow in some radishes and maybe some spinach or chard which just love this mild cool weather and wait for the rest. Did you know that every yard has its own micro climate? When the dandelions start to bloom in your grass it's time to start planting :) We've been following that rule for the last couple of years and have been successful but if you don't trust me you could always test the soil temperature by sticking your elbow in the dirt. I kid you not! If the soil feels warm on your elbow it's time to stick in the beans *grin*.

How about you, are you starting to plant anything yet?

~ Rosina

Garden Fever

It has finally warmed up enough here to start planting the garden, hooray!! It's hard to believe that we have only been snow free for 3 weeks but the bitter cold frosty mornings are still hanging on :) My oldest two are really into the garden this year and want to help out with ever aspect which is wonderful. I hope the enthusiasm holds out through the weeding season! LOL.



When we were down island last week I cheated a bit and picked up some veggie starter packs to plant along with our seedlings to give us a bit of an earlier harvest on some of the veggies. The kids picked out cabbage, broccoli, artichokes, lettuce and some sweet peas to grow up the garden fence.



Teamwork, you gotta love it! One to scoop the horse manure into the holes and another to plunk in the plants :)

And what would a day of digging in the dirt be without worms! Thank goodness there was no taste testing. Well there may have been a little dirt munching at one point, but definitely no worms made it into my 3 year olds mouth :) Now we just have to keep the slugs at bay until we can plant our warmer crops after May 24th. The danger of any frost will have passed by then and I am so looking forward to beans.

~ Rosina