Monday, February 27, 2012

Twas a dull February Day...

C. S. Lewis started one of his books with, "It was a dull autumn day and Jill Pole was crying behind the gym [at experiment house]." If instead he had started, It was a dull February day and Lucy was crying in experiment house, it could have been about our saturday. (don't worry I won't give you the whole story, this is a gardening blog!) Lucy stopped crying at restarted at irregular intervals as she does every day. More importantly, though notice at it was dull, and it also experiment house.
On a dull day, there is nothing like pretending you are a good gardener by buying something a really professional grew. Both of these little planters we purchased. I may someday have the skill to make one of these, but until then, they brought a good bit of color to our front and back porch. In the video posted below, you'll also notice the other flowers that are about to burst onto the drab scene.
We also added a Jasmine to our flock of indoor flowers. They smell wonderful and for a time this will be our center piece.



After that, I finished our automatic irrigation system for the seedling mats. Also I planted the onions and lettuce as per our garden calendar fixed with the April 20th 50% chance of last frost date. Good stuff! I'll fill you all in later on how the irrigation works and what not, but for now suffice it to say that I rigged it up so that every other day it turns on and mists the plants for 5 minutes, which is all it takes to make sure that the dirt squares stay moist the everything flourishes and doesn't blot. 
Last of all, while our girls and Mary slept on Sunday afternoon, I took a leaf from Jenni @ rainydaygardener's book. It may best be described by Mr. Gerhard Forde who said, "and he emboldened his followers to continue the mischief." I don't think that he was speaking of gardening or blogs, but it still applies. Jenni did some direct sowing and it seems to be working, so Cathrine at agardenerinprogress also did. Well, as they did, so did I. Three can't be wrong, can they? I guess only time will tell as snow is in the forecast for Wednesday. Even if my precious little lettuces, carrots, radishes and the rest don't think its such a good idea, it was very soothing. There is nothing like early planting for an impatient gardener like myself. I also got to try out some of my plant markers. All it all a very enjoyable, cloudy, rainy, dull February weekend!



1 comment:

  1. Those are such pretty planters and a wonderful thing to get to brighten a dull February day! I like the idea of the misters for your seedlings. It can be hard to keep them from drying out with a a heat mat and lights. And good luck with the new plantings!

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