Square Foot Raised Bed

Last weekend Antonio and I built the frame of our raised bed, and mixed and then filled the bed. Our mix was from the Square Foot Gardening Book, which is 4 cubic feet of peat moss, 4 cubic feet of mixed compost, and 4 cubic feed of vermiculite. The vermiculite was the hardest to find, it took me a while to finally find it. Luckily my local nursery (Woody's Nursery)  got some in stock the day I had decided to finally build the raised bed. The hardest part was mixing the ingredients, they got quite heavy, and Antonio was only able to help so much.

This weekend I finally transplanted the brocolli and cabbage that had been growing under my light shelves, and sowed more cilantro, lettuce, spinach, radishes and carrots. So the Spring Raised bed is done, and everything will grow well, and be ready to harvest before the summer plants need to go in. You can see more information about the plants that I have in our Square Foot Raised Bed by following its link to MyFolia website.

Wintersown Tomatoes

I went ahead and sent in my request for tomato seeds along with some seeds that I had saved from some tomatoes we had purchased from our Farmer's Market to Wintersown.org. They sent me all the ones I had requested, plus the alternates I had listed as well.

Wintersown sent me:

Green Zebra ~ Pretty, 3 ounce fruits ripen to light green with dark green streaking, very tasty, IND, 78 DTM

Black Prince ~ Dark brick-toned fruits about 2 - 3 ounces each, very productive, quite yum, IND, 72+ DTM

Dr. Wyche's Yellow ~ Delicious golden-yellow beefsteaks, most weighing over a half-pound, large plants, IND, 80 DTM

Black Krim ~ Mahogany-brown fruits with green shoulders, have green gel around seeds, delicious, IND, 75+ DTM

Rio Fuego ~ Blocky red paste is known for high sugar content, makes great sauce, excellent for salad too, DET, 75+ DTM

Grightmire's Pride ~ Pink oxheart tomato, mdeium-size fruits, so very yum, a bit earlier than most oxhearts. IND, 78+ DTM

Old German ~ Mennonite tomato has gold and yellow fruits with red and pink streaks, yum and pretty, IND, about 85 DTM

Golden Jubilee ~ Wonderful variety grown for decades, 3" yellow-orange globes, delicious, IND, 70 DTM

Arkansas Traveler ~ Delicious pink tomatoes about 8 oz., good cropper for hot and humid climates, IND, 85 DTM

Luther Burbank's WonderBerries ~ Solanum x burbankii,Historic, garden huckleberry makes small deep blue berries on short plants, best used for pies or jam, DET about 85 DTM

And they sent Lime Basil and Chinese Cabbage seeds as additional freebies. Wintersown is such a great program for keeping the heirloom varieties alive, and helps keep the cost of gardening down as well.

Fall Homestead Progress

The fall plants are doing well for the most part. The peas are starting to climb up their strings, and the Garlic 'German Red' has started sprouting already.

The brussels sprouts and cabbage are looking promising. The loose leaf lettuce is sprouting nicely as well. Looking forward to getting some delicious lettuce salads again. The other evening we were enjoying some fruits from our labor, we had some really good tasting homemade bread with homemade butter.

Last of the Fall Transplants

Sunday afternoon was a gorgeous day, couldn't have asked for a nicer fall day, the sun was out, but it was nice and cool due to the breeze. So while the kids were napping I got outside and removed more of the tomato plants that are done for the season, and transplanted the rest of the fall plants that I still had in my seed starting shelves. The transplants consisted of two more Brussels Sprouts, Broccoli, and Cabbage. The ones that I had transplanted already are looking good for the most part. A few are being attacked by some leaf eating pest, but the ones along the east side of the house seem to be taking off pretty well.

Fall Transplanting

This past Saturday Antonio and I got out into the garden and sowed more lettuce seeds of various varieties, and some spinach. He really enjoyed pushing the spinach seeds into the soil with his fingertip. And on Sunday Antonio and transplanted about half of our seedlings we had growing under lights. We now have some Brussels sprouts, broccoli (Packman and De Cicco) and some cabbage planted outside. I am excited to see how the brussels sprouts will do, as it is our first attempt at growing them, the surprising thing is that we only last year discovered that we really like eating them.

Fall Vegetable Sowing

Today I started indoors Broccoli, both Packman and De Cicco varieties, some Catskills Brussels Sprouts and Brunswick Cabbage to grow for our fall vegetables. Looking forward to hopefully eating some Brussels sprouts around Thanksgiving.