You harvest what you plant whether it's in your garden or in life

If you haven't planted garlic before, please don't be afraid of it. It is wonderful and easy to grow.

In the Fall (after your garden had been tilled)

#1 separate the pieces of the bulb
#2 plant the larger pieces (there's no decision making with hard neck garlic because all the cloves are large)
#3 dig a trench about 3 or 4 inches deep
#4 space the cloves 3 inches apart
#5 cover the cloves with soil
#6 water regularly all summer (I use a drip line and timer) and when the soft neck garlic starts to fall over around the middle or end of July, pull it out of the ground.
#7 dry in a place out of the reach of birds (they'll peck holes in them - um just trust me on this)
#8 store in a cool dry place, saving a few cloves to plant next year.

Just a note: unless you have amazing soil make sure to fertilize with a great organic bone meal. (Always test your soil before adding anything to it)

So how does this compare to my regular every day life. In the fall, we think about putting our gardens to bed for the winter. But there is something about knowing I've got garlic growing. Knowing is going to pop up in the spring. Usually when it shows up I know it's time to plant peas. It's a motivator to start gardening again. 

The Daily, weekly, yearly stuff can become mundane. Sometimes we just need a little something to get us going again. By planting something good in my garden in the fall, I'm more likely to plant other good things in the spring. 

A few months ago, I held a baby during church so a young mom could get a little more out of the lesson. Today that mom put her arm around me and gave me a hug when I cried during the closing hymn. It's those moments of kindness that keep us going. 

You harvest what you plant whether it's in your garden or in life. Let's be more kind, thoughtful, and willing to help others, myself included. 

Learn more about celery and see our new parrot!

Meet Mambo! She is our new Green Cheek Conure.  She is just a little different from Kiwi. She has no yellow under her wings and she is heavier.  She is a sweetheart and in just a few days she has decided she likes us.  Last night she surprised me when she jumped off her perch and ran across the top of her cage and was half way onto my finger before I had finished the words, "Step up".  I didn't even have a treat.   Wow! Green cheeks are fast learners and sweet.  She loves a head scratch.

Now more on the garden. 

More savings:

In the garden things are needing to be thinned.  Too many plants in one pot can cause damping off.  I prefer the $3 it cost me to start all of the plants inside verses the $4/plant it would cost me if I bought them as transplants at the garden center. That's major savings.  

Less work:

And because I use peat pots and fill the totes with water instead of watering the plants themselves, I water less.  Maybe once every 5 or 6 days.  

Less Waste:

When I thin the plants I don't just toss the sprouts. They become fresh treats for Kiwi and Mambo.  Well, at least Kiwi.  We are slowly getting Mambo used to fresh veggies and sprouts. She seems to love the BirdTricks diet  but is a little wary of the sprouts.

The celery is sprouting well. I am experimenting with it a little this year.  I have 12 in these little peat starters and a bunch in 3" peat pots.  I want to see what the roots do exactly and what that will do to the full size plants.   

Here's the celery in the 3" peat pots.  I will eventually thin them down to 1 plant. Last year I had great success with celery in my square foot garden. Here's a little info about Utah Celery 52-70 from Andersons Seed and Garden:

Celery requires 10-20 days at a temperature of 65 degrees Fahrenheit to germinate. Seed should be covered and kept moist. If soil dries out, it will delay germination. Keep celery well watered while growing and spray with a good fungicide once a week and fertilize every 2 to 3 weeks. Vigorous sturdy plant produces smooth, thick, long stalks that are often 9-11" to the first joint.  Should be blanched.  120 days to harvest.

And this photo of harvested celery is from their site as well:

The green onions are looking better every day.  These are from seeds that I collected from a plant that just pops up every year and goes to seed.  

You can see from this photo how colorful Kiwi is. He's been breaking off the feathers on his shoulders.  I have some calming drops for him and I have a humidifier on.  He started it when we left him alone on Christmas day.

You can see that Mambo has a little bit of breakage as well.  Hopefully after a visit to the vet for both parrots and the spring molt, they'll both be in tip top shape!

Cold Weather Vegetables

When I was in college, I majored in landscape architecture for a while.  In fact, I practically lived in the greenhouse at BYU-Idaho.  If you've ever been to Rexburg during the winter, maybe you'll understand why.  Someday I will have a greenhouse of my own.  Someday... for now I will be sprouting my veggies in south facing windows.

I just really like this photo - the drops of water on the leaves.  We've had a few cold days so I put the heating pad under the tray with the peat pots.  It worked - the black eyed susans finally sprouted! And having the dome over the tray, well, it almost feels like we have a mini rain forest in sitting on our breakfast table. I have to open them up once in a while to prevent mold build up. 

Click on it to see it larger.

These are lettuce sprouts.  Sad to know that several of those sprouts are going to get trimmed down, but only one per pot means bigger heads of lettuce. Besides I don't need that much. I've never grown lettuce before so this is all experimental to me, which I'm not afraid of at all. I do like romaine lettuce and so I do hope it grows into something edible. This is in my second tray that's hanging out in my living room window.

And here is tray # 1 - cold weather plants only.  8 - cabbage. 3 - kohlrabi. 2 pots of red onions.  1 pot of green onions. 6 - black eyed susans.  And I'm really glad that I went ahead and started the black eyed susans. It's been over 2 weeks and they are about a 1/4 inch tall. When should I start the zinnias for my daughter?

And can you see how much snow we got yesterday? Well, we received even more today.  In fact, my thoughtful husband left me the Jeep this morning so I could make sure and get back into the garage after driving to the bus stop.  We've got a very steep driveway.

Do you sprout your own veggies? I figured I could sprout 18 black eyed susans for $10 using the tray with the more expensive dome - although it's reusable all year, peat pots, soil, and seeds.  Or I could buy one pot from the garden center for $8.95.  To me it's worth the effort and challenge.  Especially when I have a 1/2 acre to landscape including my 15x40 foot garden.