Catch Up Post

The end of last week was kind of crazy so I have lots to catch up on today. On Thursday my mom crushed the end of her thumb at work. The bone is fractured and the nail came off. They had to stitch under the nail and then stitch the nail back on, time will tell if the nail ever grows back. So the end of last week I was playing care taker and last weekend I was catching up on projects I had on the go. Needless to say the garden and blog has been neglected.

Today I am going to update on things that have happened lately in the patch. The last few weeks I have got a few things done but have yet to post about them so I will group them all together today.

First off Judy gave me this award above a little over a week ago, thanks Judy! She is the author of Judy's Square Foot Garden which is based on her families garden as well as chickens and cows. Lots going on over there so check it out.

The urns were planted up with Pansies and Tulips a couple weeks ago. I attempted to grow my own this year but I started way to late, my plants are smaller then these flowers at the moment.

The dandelions are in full bloom which is a sure sign of spring. This particular one is huge and growing amongst the leeks. I will root it out before it sets seed, right now I think is looks just fine.

Last week I potted up all the peppers. They were growing two to a cell and now are one per cell. They a progressing nicely and I am sure will soon out grow their space again. If the weather holds out I am hoping to just transplant them out into the soil early May, if that doesn't happen I will have to put them in 4" pots.

Here is the early tomato take two after the first one abruptly died a little over a month ago. I was thinking the second was going to fallow them same path but it is looking good now. So I guess I will have a kind of early tomato. Given some nice spring weather it may produce at the same time as the earlier one anyway.

Shortly after posting about my news beds I put the potato bed in. So far I have just turned the soil and edged it with 2x3. The potatoes will just be grown in our yards soil with some compost added, this particular area is rather sandy which the spuds should like. The other bed I mention is looking really shady so it is currently on hold. The sun still has a ways to rise so if it gets at least 6hrs of sun by May I will put it in.

The cedar polytunnel has been taken out of the garden and put on the patio. It was moved to make room for the soon to be planted peas. Won't be long and the tunnel will be full of peppers, tomatoes, herbs and flowering plants. The nice thing about the woven poly used here is hardening off is a cinch because it diffused the sun and will not burn plants.

Radishes are up. These are easter egg which is the best radish variety I have ever grown. They bulb up well, taste mild and the colour mix is nice.

I put in a new earth machine composter which my sister picked up for me. I'm still not the biggest fan of these but the cities sell them cheap ($20) and they work well enough. I have found since I got a fork that they are much easier to turn with the fork as appose to a shovel. That was the main draw back, the turning restraints. And you may notice to the right.......

a partly installed garden. It is looking a little filthy at the moment but soon will be clean, green and looking mean. The bricks will have crushed brick swept into the cracks and will then provide more space to exit vehicles. The stone edged area will be filled with shade plant division from other areas of the yard. At the other end you can just see the potato bin turned composter. That area will have a few stepping stones that lead behind the shed and will be planted out with ground cover.