How Does Your Garden Grow - April 27

Tadaa! Ok so there's nothing going on here. It's all dead leaves and grass for now, but hopefully in a few months it'll be packed with deliciousness! I've been out turning all the dead stuff trying to aerate it, and we just planted a few radishes today. I'm sure it's too early, but I've been itching to get some stuff going!

In other news

The greenhouse is still intact! I weighted it down with cement blocks and bags of mulch, which took out the bottom layer of shelving, but I figured the sacrifice was worth knowing that it wasn't going to blow away. And it's not like the bottom shelf is very useful anyway. Here are the pictures from inside the greenhouse:

Peas

These were a huge surprise to me. I had the seed for these for 3 years (I think, possibly longer) and didn't store them properly. I just thought I'd see what happened and planted 8 of them. 3 germinated, which I'm totally happy with. They were treated seeds, which I'm not really fond of, but I'm even less fond of wasting food. I'm going to direct sow more of them once I feel a little more confident with the weather.

Squash

I'm pretty happy with these little guys too. I planted these mid-March and they survived a greenhouse tip and took their transplanting like champs. I'm going to pland more of these too. This will be the first time I try to grow squash, and decided on butternut this year because we know that Karver likes it. We used some store bought ones for baby food last year, and hopefully we will have some fresh ones this year.

Onion



I've never tried onion from seed before either, so I thought I'd try it out. I'm not expecting much from these. I planted the first batch (in the round pot) the first part of February. They're hard to see in that picture, but there are 3 of them. The second batch was planted mid-March. They are staying alive, but don't seem to be growing at all. I realize that they are in containers, but I feel like they should be getting bigger too. Of course, it's possible that they are growing and I just can't tell. I hope.

Watermelon

Most of these didn't make it through the great greenhouse tip of '14. The few that did survive seem fairly healthy. I'm planning to start more of these this week and really hope they make it. I love watermelon!

Tomatoes

You can't go wrong with tomatoes right? Well, we'll see. I've grown seedlings before but this will be my first year from seed. They are still tiny. I'm kind of worried about these, but want to learn how to grow them from seed so I can start buying heirloom and saving seeds. I have a couple of varieties, but they got mixed together when everything got dumped. I have lots and lots and lots of these. I'm hoping they start growing once it warms up.















Peppers

I've got some bell, and some jalapenos. There are some tomatoes in the pictures too. These will be really interesting because they all got mixed together, so I may develop some new mutant peppers this year! I'm going to start more seeds soon so I can tell them apart too.

Lettuce

This is something else I don't have a lot of hope for. This is from some lettuce that I tried regrowing. It was doing great in the water, but when I put it in dirt it got all shrivelly and sucky. I'm hoping that it's just transplant shock and that it'll snap out of it. I may need to get it into a cooler place than the greenhouse during the day too.

Store bought stuff

From Meijer, I have some basil, mint, and rhubarb. I've been snacking on the mint, and hope to find a way to use some of the basil soon. The rhubarb is supposed to mature in a year, I just have to decide where I want to put the rhubarb patch. 



Also from Meijer is this grapevine, which I thought I killed. Thankfully it bounced back (I'm going to attribute it to my homemade compost I planted it in.


  

 ...And raspberries

 ... and a peach tree!

and say what you want about me, but I think the peach blooms are really pretty!

Strawberries! I'm planning on getting more too

I also have a couple of blueberry bushes from Burpee. They will bring my total to 5. I thought 1 got killed over the winter. I don't know if something nibbled on it or just ran past it and broke it off, but I saw one single little bud on it, so there's hope!

 My other 2 have started budding too!

I planted these black raspberries a few years ago from my parents' house. They alternate years, so this year should be the first year I get fruit from it. They also self rooted a ton of starts, so I cut them off from the parent plant, and may soon be overrun by them!

 

These don't technically count as something I grew, but I'm planning on eating some dandelion for the first time this year. There are so many recipes I've been looking at. Does anyone have a favorite?

Flowers

 I assume these are a weed, but I kind of like them. I've seen them everywhere this year. Does anyone know what they are?

Hostas? I've never seen them flower like this though, so I could be wrong. They look awesome in person.

That's it so far! I've got a lot going on, and a lot more planned. If you have any advice for me, please feel free to leave comments below!!

Building My First Greenhouse

A couple of months ago I found a greenhouse on sale at Big Lots. It is the Village Green basic walk-in greenhouse. Full price is $70, but I got it on sale for $50. I have been wanting a greenhouse for several years, so I couldn't resist the price. Buying it, I knew full well that there was a very good chance that it would be a big pile of junk and I would have to return it. It's been eating away at me that it's been sitting in my garage, just waiting to be put together. After many snowstorms and ceaseless rain, I finally got a day off when the weather somewhat agreed with me. It was a little chilly, but hey, you've got to take what you can get.

 

 

Inside the box are bags with all the parts.

 

 

Each bag is labelled...

 

 

...so you can tell what parts are shown in the instructions. The instructions are very simple, which had me worried for a little bit, but luckily no description is necessary. Putting it together reminded me of putting together a tent.

 

 

Eva even helped with it.

 

 

 

The frame was really easy to put together. I have been more frustrated trying to put together those pressed wood furniture kits. It felt slightly flimsy, but the whole time I kept reminding myself that it was a budget greenhouse. I could have put it together myself, but Eva wanted to help. Connecting the top frame to the base frame was a little tricky on my own, and an assistant would have been helpful for putting on the cover, but it was all doable alone. It took me about 30 minutes total, and probably would have been a little less without waiting for Eva to delicately put the frame together, but the time invested was worth it.

 

 

Then I forgot to take a picture of the finished product until it was getting dark out.

 

Pros:

Price

It's fairly sturdy

It heated up pretty quickly inside

It's a greenhouse!

 

Cons:

The shelving is pretty flimsy. I'm going to try to figure out something to make it better though.

It's really light, which is great for moving around, but bad for the winds we get at times. For tonight I have it weighted down with the milk jugs full of water that can be seen in the photo, but I will be getting concrete blocks to tie it down. It comes with little hooks to put into the ground, but as I have it on my concrete driveway that isn't an option. They look like they'd just pull up in strong winds anyway.

The zipper on the flap seems like it's going to be an issue. I already had some problems with it and it tore the cover in a small spot. I can fix it with duct tape, but it's definitely an issue.

 

Overall, I'm happy with my purchase. I knew from the beginning that it wasn't going to be a premium product, but was pleasantly surprised with how well it's actually put together. Like everything else in my life, I will probably be fiddling with this to hopefully improve it, but out of the box it's a pretty solid product.