Less Than a Month 'Til Spring

I am getting so excited, it's less than a month until spring! I'm going to start a few veggies indoors this week in newspaper pots; peas and spinach. I also want to get a nice crop of spring carrots this year too. Usually I wait too late to plant them and only get a fall crop.

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Last Bit of Spinach

Spinach, as you may know, is a cool-weather growing plant. This means it grows best in the spring or fall. Hot summer weather makes it go to seed. I harvested all the spinach in my ground garden and pulled the plants out. I had a few spinach plants growing in pots on my back porch, but as they weren't doing much I just composted them. Most of the spinach on the balcony got harvested too, and bagged for the freezer. We will eat that throughout the summer and that way we'll have spinach until the fall crop comes in. This is the last spinach plant I have; it was on the balcony and is so pretty and hasn't gone to seed. I can't bear to eat it just yet. It's just enough to have for a light lunch meal, like a few leaves in grilled cheese sandwiches for the kids or on a few veggie subs.

Early June Garden 2007

This is from the first weekend in June. The garden is coming along ok even though the weather has been iffy. I only have a little spinach left. I'm going to keep these plants in until the weather gets too hot for them.



Here are some green beans and right in front some squash. I am happy to say the beans look much better now than in this pic, LOL



Corn early June. It's coming up good and growing fast. I have black beans growing near it too.



Here are the only spinach plants I have left. I harvested a lot and we ate a lot, it was delicious! I also froze 6 bags. I hope to get a lot more with my fall crop. I left the smaller plants up to see if I can't get more growth from them...I will probably leave them in until the weather gets too hot.



My tomato plants right before transplant. These are cherry tomato plants. I had a late start on planting these because my prior seedlings froze on the porch and died. These came up right away though, and I think I'll get a nice batch of tomatoes from them.

Spinach in the Ground May 2007

I finally got my spinach in the ground, I hope I get a nice crop this spring. I took these pics last week or so ago and the spinach has already grown a lot since then. I love spinach so much and it tastes so great fresh from the garden.

Spinach and Onion Growing Early May 2007

Kitchen window early May 2007. Spinach and onion growing. I have to get this spinach in the ground. With spinach you've got to get it in early. Last year I planted it too late it went to seed when the hot weather hit. I did get some spinach, but not as much as I hoped. I hope to get a nice spring crop and fall crop this year.



I have this onion that sprouted, I am not sure what to do with it. Last year I grew the really small green onion from seed. This is a big yellow onion I bought from the market that started growing on it's own. I wonder if I treat it like a sprouted potato, will it grow the same? Just keep covering it with dirt as it grows? I will do more research and let you all know.

Summer Garden Plan

In the ground I am doing a 3 Sisters garden (corn, beans, and squash) and everything else I am growing in 5-10 gallon containers or bigger on my balcony. This is because we have a lot of deer and other assorted fauna coming in and out of the yard and they will eat up all the garden. My container veggies will be broccoli, tomatoes, spinach, radish, onion, carrots, cucumber, eggplant, cabbage, lima beans, brussel sprouts, and sweet pepper. Maybe beets, too. Definitely herbs as well, particularly basil, oregano, parsley. and I love mint, tea made from fresh peppermint is the best! And they grow best in containers anyway. I'll do peppermint, spearmint, and orange bergamot mint. I will also try for some blueberries and raspberries this year, both in the ground and container.

How to Create Seed-Starting Pots From Newspapers
http://www.ehow.com/how_1745_create-seed-starting.html

How to Design a Container Vegetable Garden
http://www.ehow.com/how_12183_design-container-vegetable.html
http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/hil/hil-8105.html
http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/cornucop/2000074323014514.html

See more progress on: grow my own vegetables