We've had nasty, cold, wet weather this week, and I have been down with a nasty cold myself, but the garden babies continue to grow at their own pace. Outside the lettuce rows have sprouted, and there's now solid evidence of pea sprouts from the Lincoln green peas in the raised bed. My second crop of lettuce, sown in a large pot, has also sprouted, although I have yet to see any signs of the carrots. All three of the lettuce varieties are doing well, and eventually I will have to thin the rows so that the heads will have room to grow, but we aren't there yet.
Inside the Jiffy pots are full of seedlings. The tomatoes are getting their first true leaves, and the squash seedlings are really getting long and turning into vines. I might have lost one of my pots of DAR Cucumber, having been too sick to come upstairs and check on them for a few days, but I have plenty of backups and can plant more seeds directly outdoors in April if I need to. The Jiffy pots will also need thinning soon, but I want to wait a little longer to see which sprouts do the best with early leaf formation.
During the last warm weather over the Presidents Day weekend, we bought more garden soil for the raised beds and also picked up several bags of plants at Costco to start filling in the shade bed along the patio. It's a very sheltered area so not exposed to the worst of the cold and wind, and when we moved in the only things growing there were clumps of boring monkey grass. We planted hostas and astilbe and will see how they get along until April, when we can start filling in with more plants from the local garden centers. I hope to add some bleeding heart and ferns and other shade lovers eventually.
The daylilies and daffodils continue to shrug at whatever the weather dishes out, but I can tell that we will have plenty of empty spots in the bank bed to fill once spring arrives. Luckily I keep getting plant catalogs in the mail to give me ideas!
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