potting up!

I re-potted my zucchini a couple of weeks ago and they instantly went little-shop-of-horrors on me. So I decided to wait on the tomatoes because I'm short on indoor growing space.
Well they can wait no more, the poor little buggers are cramped. I was able to get to about 32 of them yesterday: all San Marzano and Cherokee Purple. Hopefully I'll get the rest done today or tomorrow. Since I only have a few grow lights (and my house has nearly no direct sunlight) I'll be moving a couple of flats to my mom's house, which has big south facing windows. Hopefully the tomatoes thrive like the zukes.
I'm planning to start setting everything out in about 3 weeks. All garden growth seems about 3 weeks ahead of schedule this year so I think that will be safe.

germination trays

I see a lot of transplanting in the near future.

2012 indoor sowing complete

The onions are coming along nicely. I ended up filling the tray with all onions and decided to start tomatoes in cells again.
Here's the list:

San Marzano - 18
Cherokee Purple - 12
Box Car Willie - 6
Hillbilly - 6
Brandywine - 9 Red, 9 Yellow
Zucchini (raven) - 8
Summer Squash (gentry) - 4

Luckily I can set the onions out in early April, because I'm going to need lots of room when I transplant these babies up!

*incidentally, it brings me immeasurable joy when my 3.5 year old come in when I'm planting seeds and says, "are you planting yellow Brandywine, red Brandywine?"

onion-ettes

Pretty nice germinating.

first seeds started

Tonight I sowed a bunch of onions! My first time trying onions from seed. I've always had poor results with onion sets. They make great spring onions, but I never get anything resembling a big round bulb. These are a large storage onion from Burpee. I'd love to grow enough so that I won't need to buy grocery store onions for a while.

In a few weeks I'll add tomatoes to the tray. Onions and tomatoes are the only things I'm starting indoors this year. I'll plant four tomato varieties: San marzano, Cherokee purple, red Brandywine, and yellow Brandywine. Growing tomatoes indoors makes me so happy. It's like a little nursery. Squeal!

this blanket of snow is a blanket of woe

Saturday we got 9" of snow. I shouldn't pout too much, it's the only significant snow fall this winter. And it's rapidly melting today as temps are in the 40's.
I washed and dried one large seed tray and will likely start onions soon. I'm excited to grow onions from seed. I hope I get some large ones. Sets have always been disappointing for me, beyond spring onions.

gardening on new year's eve (eve)

So far this has been an exceptionally mild winter. Fear of global warming aside - it's been nice. This morning we helped my uncle as he planted nearly 200 garlic cloves in his garden.
Up the road a little, in my far more modestly sized garden, I finally cleared out the summer's debris. With the arrival of baby #2 in May I hardly had time to harvest anything, let alone actually do garden work. But this week I was able to pull dead plants, dispose of rogue subsoil potatoes and fertilize. I turned in about 25 gallons of partially composted cow manure then planted thirty-some of my own garlic. Today I employed my brother's muscle to top-dress with another 25 gallons of manure. (so much for letting the beds rest in 2012)
I decided to leave the Glads and dahlias in the ground so I threw some hay on them and we'll see if they survive the winter. Part experiment, part lazy.
In 2012 I'd like to start beautifying my garden area. I'm think of mulching all the pathways (with wood mulch instead of hay this time). I'd also like to plant some climbing vines on the fences. I'd love some mandarin honeysuckle and probably some clematis if I can find a white one. I think my girls would really enjoy if I could make it secret garden-y.