A Nice Surprise

I went and laid out my calendar for starting seeds for next year--its all plotted out for succession planting through the spring and fall, so I should be able to maximize mmy garden this year. I also made a schedule for placing my seed orders...and then one of them showed up yesterday. I have my Red Robin tomatoes (to be grown indoors next winter for year round tomatoes!) and mini head lettuce seeds from Containerseeds.com. So one less order to place.

I also got talking to a friend last night who has his own garden and has done a fair amount of canning (he brought amazing home made salsa and hummus to the party we were at) and he offered me the use of his canning equipment so I can try it out next season. I just have to buy the jars and lids. Pretty exciting.

The Baker Creek order goes out this week, and since I am splitting a Cook's Garden and Chile Woman order with co-workers, those will go out later in the month. I still need to decide on mint plants since my mojito mint is dead dead dead from these stupid aphids that came in the house on them (and the spearmint and chocolate mint...those are doing OK though) I lost the mints I had last winter to aphids too, and I am using a home made soap spray on them this time, but I can't seem to beat them into submission. fortunately they have not spread to anything else, and I doubt they will if they have not done so by now.

I added a list to the blog of plants I want to grow at some point. Looking at these seed catalogs makes me crazy as there are SO MANY things I want to try. Some I know will have to wait until I have my own place--my landlord was pretty cool with the small farm I installed on his roof last year, but I doubt corn will ever go over well, and asparagus might be a tough sell in a container. I'll research more and add in for next year. I definitely want to do potatoes next year, at least.

I've done some thinking on the local diet the past few days and I think I may be crystalized to the point of actually writing about it soon.