Potatoes and Lettuce and Beets! Oh My!

We survived the “LINE OF STORMS OR EPIC PROPORTIONS! yesterday”. Which means that it was windy and a bit of rain until around 2:30a when there was a bunch of thunder and lightening and then a boatload of rain for about 20 minutes……And then just clouds and gloom until late this afternoon when we actually saw the sun.

But at least LL and I were able to get a bit of gardening done yesterday morning before the LINE OF STORMS OF EPIC PROPORTIONS!

Oh isn’t that just lovely. We decided this year to put landscape cloth down on the paths to cut down on the weeding a bit and keep down the mud.

It has absolutely NOTHING to do with the fact that it makes everything look nice and neat and tidy.

Not that we are obsessive about that or anything.

Moving on.

Try to ignore the large patch of weedy ground to the left of the tomato stakes. THAT does not belong to us. If it did belong to us then surely you would see both my head and LL’s head blow apart with the thought of all those weeds.

Weeds that do not belong to us….but are about to set out seeds….right into our nicely maintained garden.

Not that I am bitter or anything.

The beets are growing happily. They were delayed a bit with the late frost but have perked up. It is almost time to sow the next round of seeds. Yummmmmmmmm.

Marigold seeds are so funky looking. We have a tiny strip of bare soil running along the edge of each of the tomato beds and we decided that this year we would plant marigold seeds rather than buying plants.

But on a windy day and without my glasses I was having a heck of a time seeing where I had dropped the seeds. Who knows where the flowers will actually come up.

We are again doing potatoes this year. We are growing them in burlap “potato bags” made by yours truly. The bag with all the potato plants already coming up? Those are all volunteers that took root in the compost pile. LL and I hate to waste any kind of plant so we just dug them up and put them in one of the pots. I will keep you posted on how they do.

The lettuce is lovely and yummy and just about ready for the first harvest. In fact LL took a bit of it home. I am over run with lettuce at the moment and so did not pick any. I had to pick up a friend’s CSA box on Tuesday and the lettuce therein will not last until she gets back. THANK YOU BONNIE!!!

And then there are the tomatoes.

We planted 26 tomato plants on Saturday.

Twenty. Six.

Most evenly divided between paste and eating tomatoes with two different cherry tomato varieties thrown in.

Every year the problem that LL and I encounter is that over the course of the summer the little name tags that come with the tomato plants get lost. And by the time the summer is done and we evaluate how well the different varieties have done for us….we cannot remember what the varieties were that we planted. I was contemplating this while laying in bed and all of a sudden the answer came to me!

Eureka I’ve got it! Laminated name tags attached to the stakes and cages with zip ties.

And I liked those so much that I am making laminated name tags for the potatoes as well.

And possibly the peppers.

It’s the little things in life that make us so darn happy.

Hello? Is it time for Bacon, Lettuce and Tomahhhhto sandwiches yet?

Raging Hot Radish Batman!

Today we had produce from the garden.

In May.

Joy of joys and a big hallelujah!

Now, it isn’t all that much produce so don’t get yourself too excited. It is May after all and it is the Frozen Northeast Ohio and we did have snow flurries on Mother’s Day I am told. I wasn’t here to witness it thankfully but Knit Sib Larissa kindly put a picture up on Facebook for all to see.

LaurenLeap and I were in the garden for three hours today just diggin’ in the dirt and pullin’ the weeds and generally getting our gardening mojo on. We did manage to dig up some self sprouting potatoes and get them into one of the potato pots that I made (more on that in another post) and LaurenLeap spent time thinning the beets. Or she was SUPPOSED to be thinning but I suspect that what she was really doing was gently pulling up the seedling and transplanting them. Oh it felt good to be in the garden. I will admit that come October in my gardening year I am ready to be done. I am ready to put the garden to rest, to close the garden gate and go read a book. That feeling lasts until around February I would say and then I start to dream about the garden. And the produce.

Then comes April when LaurenLeap and I look at each other and think, “You know, we COULD get out there and plant something like spinach and lettuce. It isn’t THAT cold.”

But really it IS too cold. Unless you are Scott, one of our gardening buddies, who has a small cold frame.

We want one. Badly.

We do get out there by the end of April and plant spinach and lettuce and beets. By the middle of May we have broccoli in the ground and we are desperately wondering when we can plant tomatoes…..and Brussels sprouts….and beans. Today, as we were working, up walked one of the new garden plotters by the name of Jim. He handed us plants he wasn’t using. He THOUGHT they were the rest of his Acorn squash but he had lost the name tag somewhere along the walk from his plot to ours. They might be Butternut but he is pretty sure they are Acorn and did we want them?

Ummmmmmmmm, Is the Pope Argentinian? YES!

Those went in the ground today as well.

And when we were almost finished I noticed that there were actually some radishes that were large enough for just one mouthful. There were two of them. Now how nice is that! Two of them and two of us.

Can I just give a hearty YUM! LaurenLeap ate hers and thought there wasn’t much flavor to it…..and then the heat kicked in. WATER!

Radish sandwiches are in my future.

And when I walked back to Coco and drove home I was the proud possessor of spinach for our salads tonight AND enough Rhubarb to make a dozen muffins.

Joy of joys I love gardening.

Now I have to figure out what to do with the half sack of garlic that LaurenLeap gave me. I think I am going to finely chop it, put it in oil and freeze it. You should NEVER store garlic in oil at room temperature or in the refrigerator. Unless you are looking to get a really great case of Botulism.

Just your PSA for the day. You can thank me later.

The 2013 Gardening Season Begins

Are you ready!

It’s time for the first Community Garden post of the season. You know you wait for these! I know I do.

Saturday was gorgeous, a bit windy perhaps but gorgeous. So of course LaurenLeap and I had to spend a bit of time in the garden. I am going to admit something……

LL is more community garden dedicated than I am. I know, that is hard to believe but…..she is. She has already put in a bunch of hours out there re-measuring and re-aligning the garden beds.

We decided at the end of last year that we were going to combine some of the garden beds and take out some of the paths. That gives us extra growing space and heaven knows we need MORE of that. See, longer beds. LL was out there several weeks ago putting in new stakes and measuring. I was not. Oops.

LL was also out in the garden sometime during the winter months to put in some garlic. Yes, I know that garlic can be rather cheaply purchased at the grocery store but you know us, we like to see if we can grow stuff. Just because we can.

It looks like LL is working on the paths but really she isn’t. She is getting the bed ready so that she could plant spinach. I was tasked with weeding and prepping paths. I was the manual labor. Remember, that is because I am a tad more shall we say “free form” in my seed planting placement. I guesstimate sometimes. LL is much more precise. That is why she plants and I weed.

I spend a great deal of time pulling this grass up. It is the enemy and it must be destroyed. But that is very difficult to accomplish because it grows by tendrils under the ground. I might be successful in pulling up the plant, or think I am successful, but if there is any of the root left then the thing will rise again, like The Mummy, and plague us.

Grrrrrrrrrrr.

I think that is all for now.

And just in case you were wondering, this is what we are planning on growing this year. The list is an evolving one at the moment but this about covers it.

Potatoes
Basil
Beans
Brussels Sprouts
Tomatoes, both paste and eating
Beets
Shallots and garlic
Carrots
Spinach
Lettuce
Peas
Broccoli
Kale
Rhubarb
Zuccini
Sunflowers
cutting flowers
herbs