Design Kebun

Whenever the outside weather threatens to retreat back to winter, I just sneak down to the basement where several shelves of seedlings are happily growing under grow-lights, reminding me that spring has truly arrived!

Here are my artichoke seedlings - it's been about a month since I last posted their progress. I was a few weeks late in starting them, but they're growing like crazy now and the liquid fish food I gave them two days ago will also help push them along. Soon, it will be time to put them outside to give them a bit of a 'mini-winter'.. then, once the warm weather arrives, they'll think they're in their 2nd season and (hopefully) produce piles of tender artichokes! (I gave details on this sneaky trick in an earlier post..)

On another seed-related note, a few months ago, my mother-in-law, Noha requested some seeds - cotton seeds. When she was a young girl growing up in the mountains of Lebanon, her grandmother grew cotton inside the house. Noha remembers being spellbound by the puffy white balls on the end of the branches and she was hoping I could get some seeds for her. Well, I did and I kept a few for myself too - I'm hoping to grow it on our very hot and sunny deck - they kids are so excited! The seedlings are about 3 weeks old now and here is a photo that I took yesterday of the biggest one.

Now, I'm new to cotton, so if anyone has attempted this before, feel free to offer advice!

Soon it will be time to start the summer squash and cucumber seed indoors.. They typically need about a month of growth before transplanting to the garden. I plan on sowing those seeds this weekend, as well as planting another dozen or so things directly into the veggie patch.. Isn't this the best time of the year!

Happy Gardening!