So I was trying to figure out how to store my seeds nicely and to see exactly what colour flower is in the packet. This is what I came up with. I went to the dollar store and bought small plastic re sealable bags, they didn't have the small brown envelopes so I went to staples and bought those there. They were a little more expensive then I would have liked them to be but I did get 250 of them so they will last me awhile ;)
Last year I just put my collected seeds in plastic ziplock bags, but I wanted to do something a little prettier this year. I haven't collected to many seeds yet this year but I did collect a few pansies. So the flowers in the picture are from the seeds I collected last year and so are the seeds. I'm hoping to collect more seeds this year and maybe some veggies too, we will see.
Ok back to the envelopes, I cut some of my blooming flowers and layed them flat in the plastic bags and sealed them. Then I took what I had left of my seeds from last year and put them into the brown envelopes. I taped the plastic bags onto the envelope and wrote on the back what it was. So along with the text there is a visual as well.
I just hope they dry nicely, the bags are not airtight.
Wow!!! So I went on vacation for almost two weeks (which I'm never doing in the summer again btw) and I came home to giant veggies. Thanks to one of my best friends who took really good care of all my plants, they look amazing. I had my first kohlrabi out of my garden today and it was delicious.
All my vegetables are doing amazing in the soil mixture I put them in, even my squash are now starting to produce fruit. Here again is what I put into my soil.
In a 6' X 2' X 2' garden box
12 bags 50 L organic all purpose potting soil
1 bag 50 L sea soil
1 bag 50 L sheep manure
1/2 bag 25 L worm castings
1/2 bag 25 L vermiculite
1 C Epsom salts
1 C egg shell powder
It's been about 5 or 6 weeks since everything has been put in the garden and we are now starting to eat veggies from it. My peas are blooming and carrots and beets are doing great too. It's a little crowded in there and I will be doing things a little different next year, but I'm quite pleased with how things are turning out.
Omg!! My first harvest, ok so it's one radish but I'm totally excited! I planted everything about 3 weeks ago in my awesome dirt mixture, well at least I think it's awesome. The recipe is in an earlier post. Everything is doing really well, and when I saw that radish a couple of days ago I thought, wow that's big. I pulled it out today and it was a decent size radish. I say was cause my husband and I gobbled it up immediately. It was really good. I replanted two more in its place. Yeah I love this!
Lol, well sort of. So here is a little update of everything that's been going on in the garden front. My petunias are blooming, my snapdragons are about too and everything else is doing great.
Now for the veggie garden, I didn't have any luck with my own kohlrabi or lettuce (starting them indoors) however once I just planted the lettuce seeds outside they came right up. I ended up buying a couple of packs of kohlrabi from my local nursery, and they just exploded once I put them in the garden boxes. I did make a boo boo in one of my boxes, actually I'm sure I've made several ;) but live and learn. I planted my peppers with my kohlrabi thinking they would grow with them and since they were bigger I figured it would be alright. Not.. Like I said the kohlrabi exploded and my poor little peppers are now not getting any light. So I may be moving them very shortly, I just don't know where too. I think I'm alright the the other box. I tried to make sure I planted taller things in the back and smaller things in the front. We will see. We have been getting a lot of rain showers daily so I haven't had to water much, which is awesome. But we do need a few good days of sun.
I have to say I love my garden boxes, my father in-law made them for me and they rock. No bending over of any sort.
Well I will keep you posted on my progress. Oh I have been finding ladybugs and putting them in my boxes, I have aphids on my peppers. So far they have been sticking around, but if they can't get a handle on them I may try a couple of the natural remedies I have found on Pinterest :)
Happy gardening!!
Wow time flies when your having fun, I planted my garden (in raised beds) I will take some pictures when everything is up. Everything is now outside, my cucumbers and 2 of my squash are a little sad, I'm hoping that they will recover. Hopefully next year I will have a green house and they will stay inside. My tomatoes that I started from seed are very happy to be outside and I planted them with basil, I read it helps deterr pests and makes the tomatoes taste better.
I also put all my petunias and snapdragons outside (the seeds that I started and collect from my plants last year). They are doing great. I will continue to collect seeds, the germination rate for my own seeds was 95% vs the store bought seeds at about 65%. However that was flowers only, my store bought veggie seeds were fine.
On another note my brother in-law made me a bird house and I painted it today. Now just have to put it outside and it will be ready from some occupants :)
I've been very busy and loving every minute of it. Hopefully I will have some time to write again soon.
One more week and I think everything can go outside, a good thing too because my squash, cucumber and zucchini are huge. I wanted so badly to put them out this weekend but my mom told me to wait until after the full moon, she said " it doesn't matter what the forecast says you will get one more cold snap" I know she's right, I've lived here long enough to know. I have been putting them outside during the day to harden them off so that when I do put them out it won't be a shock. Thanks to all my gardening friends for all your advice:)
All the things my mom did but I never payed attention, I just loved eating all her hard work ;) but now I realize how much work it really is and I love every minute of it.
I got almost all my yard work done, I found a zone 3 blackberry bush I'm very excited for and also bought a lilac for my husband (he loves lilacs). It's been a very busy weekend. I also got my raised garden beds planted. My sqaure foot garden plot kinda went out the window, turned more into a spiratic planting of seeds. We will see what happens, lol.
I transplanted some of my veggies today. I have done a lot of reading on what type of fertilizer to use, how much to use, all kinds of different recipes. I still don't know, so like I always do I take snippets of info and make it my own.
In my mix I used organic all purpose potting soil, sea soil, vermiculite, bone meal, worm castings and Epsom salt I left out the coffee grounds this time :) As for ratios, I didn't measure. But I'm thinking it went a little like this,
8 C organic potting soil
3 C organic sea soil
1 C vermiculite
3 Tbs of worm castings
2 Tbs bone meal
1 Tbs Epsom salt
So far all plants seem very happy, I put cucumber, squash, tomato and ornamental corn in this mixture. I will let you know what happens in the next few days. Also be very careful when transplanting cucumber or anything for that matter. I accidentally ripped part of the root system of a cucumber plant and it was not happy, I think it will live but it looked very sad and it's leaves it curl a bit. Try not to disturb the roots to much.
