Monday, March 4, 2013

It begins!

March 3 is a bit early to be starting any gardening here in Southeastern Massachusetts. Luckily for me, I just had a big birthday, and my husband surprised me with lots of wonderful gifts, including two cold frames. Having just gone on an Eliot Coleman binge, I've been learning a lot about year round food production in our climate. So Eric, as always, was thoughtful in picking out this highly appropriate gift.

Today was a very mild day, so we put Isaac in the stroller, and did a little yard work, including setting up the frames. I planted kale, endive, arugula, Swiss chard, Brussels sprouts, a few different mesclun mixes, and a few varieties of lettuce. I planted them, covered them up with newspaper, and watered them. We shall see if they germinate. We were a little early in planting them but I was too excited to wait!

We also planted some garlic that was sprouting on our windowsill. We won't get any cloves out of it, but it should provide a long supply of garlic greens to use for the summer. I'm planning to plant some garlic in the fall.

HOW TO PLANT GARLIC:
In case you aren't up on the old Pinterest, you can plant  garlic cloves (organic- not sure if any other kind would work) & you'll get lovely green shoots that taste like garlic.  If you plant the cloves outdoors in the fall, in the summer (July-ish) you'll see that your one little clove has grown a whole family!  I'm just planting ours on the windowsill so that we don't have to throw them away.

The other sprouting thing we have hanging around are some potatoes that have multiple eyes. I may throw them in the ground this week and see what happens. I have never grown potatoes so we will see.

Last project was soaking a shiitake mushroom log that was another very thoughtful birthday gift. I'm ready to dump the water and see if we get any shrooms. I will report back!

Also- gratuitous baby pic.







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