February 13, 2017

organizing seed packets

I’m so excited – all the seeds I ordered this year have arrived! Yeah! Almost as fun as planting them is putting them away in my seed organizer. To store my seeds, I have a plastic box with a lid that holds standard-sized, heavy, 1-inch expanding envelopes. I have 20 of these envelopes. Each I’ve labelled with a type of vegetable. I have Bush Beans, Pole Beans, Roots (carrots, beets, etc), Flowers, Tomatoes, etc. Each seed packet goes into the appropriate folder. I love the way this set-up works.…

February 13, 2017

app updates

I’ve been working on updates to Skippy’s Calendar apps. It’s really fun – like imagining a summer garden in the middle of winter! We’ll have more plants and more seed sowing information added to both our Flower & Herb app and our Vegetable app. Updates will be available in a week or two (or three) to all purchases made now or later.

February 12, 2017

snow shoeing to my garden

Ten days after my last post and our scenery is whiter. And colder. We had 10 inches of snow Thursday and another 3 or 4 last night. It looks like we’re in a snowy pattern with more to come.

January 30, 2017

crop rotation

I recently finished making plans for my vegetable gardens and posted the diagrams. A reader noticed I always plant my butternut squash in one place: on the arbor in the middle of my community garden plot. I like it there. It looks nice and does well. But the reader asked: Why don’t you rotate its location? Well my view is crop rotation is more often important for farmers growing big fields of vegetables. Growing in a small space is different. It’s hard to separate plants in a 500 sq ft…

January 29, 2017

garden plans

So far, this is what I have for my garden plans. Maybe a draft, but for now it’s a start. I’m working on detailed plans for the plantings in the front three beds of my community garden. I want to make them look really nice.

January 27, 2017

I’m working on my garden plans today and hope to be done tomorrow. I’m encorporating crop rotation and allocating space for all of the varieties I want to grow. Plus, I want to include lots of flowers that attract beneficial insects and make the gardens beautiful. I want to reduce planting in rows this year and go for more patches and combined plantings.

January 24, 2017

a gray day

We’ve got rain, snow, sleet, and slush today. Dull gray skies. Dreary. The dogs and I walked on muddy, slippery trails. Mud in the car, mud in the house, then “paw baths”. A good evening to sit by the fire.

January 22, 2017

planting shelves, seeds, and trays

My planting shelves and lights are ready to go! My husband set them up for me. (Thanks Steve!) Rather than putting them in the garage this year, they are in a small pantry where I store my canned goods, books, etc. I can adjust the temperature in here without heating up a large room. Last year they grew very slowly in the 60F garage. I addition to having the shelves ready, I just sent out my last seed order – the snail mail one to Sand Hill. I’m enjoying seeing…

January 14, 2017

seed catalog

Today I ran across a seed company I didn’t know about. NE Seed Co. They have a really nice catalog. I was getting my haircut and they had the catalog on the table. What hair salon has seed catalogs! Great reading. I just requested a copy. I can always find room for a few more varieties in my garden, but mostly I want to finish reading it. NE Seed Co is a seed distributor located in Hartford CT.

January 13, 2017

5 weeks ’til I start planting!

It’s 16 weeks ’til my last spring frost – which means only 5 weeks ’til I start planting! OK, it’s still a while, but why not start getting ready. I have to clean off my plant shelves, get my pots and trays out of the garden shed and clean them all, make sure I have potting soil, and get my seeds ready to go. I’ll be using my planting app again. It’s made it very easy for me to keep up with what to plant when. It’s at the Apple…

weeks and counting until my last spring frost