Seeds are in!

 Hello!! Seeds are in from Prairie Moon and on their way from Strictly Medicinal and Baker Creek. That, I think, is the last of it until the plants start shipping in mid-March. 

Today Gryph repaired our leaky hose and cut open a lot of boxes for me. I finished the greenhouse floor (for a while: it is biodegradable after all, and will need done again) and started on the area around the greenhouse. Our friend is working on liberating her hardwood floors from the carpet and assorted tacks and staples. Once she starts bringing empty boxes by again I'll start laying the "garden floor" but until then, we need to go out and cut down the weed trees which are in my way.

What a concept!! "Weed trees." Growing up in the desert where these trees were scarce it just astounds me that they're so abundant here they can only be classified as weeds! But there you have it, they come up everywhere, make walking impossible, and the ailanthus trees even kill off other plants. So down they all come and get covered with cardboard to keep them down--because the cut seedlings come back year after year if you don't actually dig them out! Who knew that could happen? Never would have in the desert, sheesh! Really caught me off-guard.... but you notice I'm still here where there's enough rain to support weed trees, eh? And I'm staying here, especially if my garden succeeds, because I'll have deepened my roots in this place. There's just something about planting trees and flowers that ties me to the land, and growing food as well sets me firmly into the seasonal cycle of a particular place. I belong here. Just as much as this place belongs to me, I belong to this place. I belong to this land. I belong to this home and garden.

Today is lovely warm and bright, a brief respite before low double-digit temps freeze us all out on Saturday. I discovered that the greenhouse plastic acts like shade cloth, so I left the door tied open for a while to get some sun on my babies and also turned the pots to get them to straighten up and stop leaning. Pretty sure the 2017 seed is not up at all and the seedlings are all lettuce from 2021 seed stock. The peas (also from 2021) are very slow but continue to peek up over the soil surface. No sign of the chard, carrots, or beets.

Tomorrow I need to get my calendula and prairie sage into a 72 cell propagator and into the greenhouse; this evening I'll check on which of my other seeds need that kind of cold moist stratification (definitely this year's chard, carrots, and beets, sheesh). I can plant more peas and the sweet peas also, but not in the same propagator. Don't want to take any chance on mixing those up because sweetpeas are toxic. They'll be by themselves and well-labeled--probably in another deli chicken container since the dome is high.

<intermission>

Gryph and I have worked a bit more while there was light. He cut down some of the weed trees and we both worked on getting that topsoil off the driveway and into the garden cart, then spread into a low spot. Here he's working on the north side of the wheelchair ramp:

And then he spread the dirt onto a low spot:

Soon as we have that patch filled, we'll cover it with cardboard to await garden plants!

Checked the indoor seedlings. A miracle has occurred. For the very first time EVER, wild strawberries have germinated for me! We even have a couple tomatoes showing green hints right at soil level. All hail the warmth of the fridge top!!! 

For now, it's early supper and a heating pad. Whatever tomorrow brings, I'm looking forward to it!