Guess what time it is again?? That's right, gardening, seeding and planting time!
This year, I'm super excited to be, once again, growing my own food! It's very rewarding to know you took your time and dedication to care for it and the added bonus is that it saves you money AND you get even more nutrients as it's picked straight from the garden! I know I mentioned this last year when I took my canning class, but for those of you that didn't catch it, I posted a fact about our food. Food loses nearly HALF, read 50%!!!!! of it's nutrients just one week after it's picked! Think of all the produce that you eat that comes from different areas of the world. Makes you wonder how many nutrients are left in them, doesn't it? This is why it is so important for people to eat local foods that come from farmers markets! The freshest you can get! Also, it helps the environment by not having to travel so far. Of course, when you live in places like I do, the frozen tundra, you have to eat the shipped produce during the winter months. However, when you are able to, during the spring, summer and fall months, local produce is the way to go!
There are some new developments with my garden. My landlord gave me an even BIGGER plot this year to garden, so I really have my work cut out for me! With hopefully getting busier with the business though, I knew that I wouldn't be able to get it all done by myself. So my new friend, Kate, whom I originally met at the gym, is going to be helping me out! I'm excited to have someone to help me grow and eat up these vegetables!
Kate and I modeling a car at a recent event. :)
Kate and I sat down not too long ago to go over just what exactly we wanted to plant.
We came up with this list:
This weekend, we spent some time planting the seeds in my house. I wanted to get the seedlings started so that we could get them out as soon as the weather is consistently warm.
We planted 2 types of tomatoes (cherry and beefsteak), parsley, squash (spaghetti and small yellow), 3 different varieties of lettuce, peppers, and we already have strawberries and chives outside! Kate said she would like to experiment with a row of carrots (I warned her about my results from last year) and I have yet to get basil planted too.
Seedlings sitting by my windows...
I also found this online recently and forgot that I would love to try this! It's a way to grow celery without even buying a seed!
I stole this picture from FARMER'S PAL. I couldn't find anything like it and they posted it on their Facebook page on April 18th. Find it HERE. And definitely like their page! A cute little page, it's interesting to look through!
Turns out, you can grow celery from the end of the celery that you cut off! I'm going to by some organic celery and test this out! So fun! I'm so glad they posted that idea!
I will also this year, be testing the soil at my place for lead. My landlord suggested it and said she would even pay for it if need be because she was curious. However, Minneapolis offers free lead testing. For anyone living in the are and wanting to test their soil, check out this site. It appears that the U of M offers a more extensive test though for a low cost which can be found here.
I'm proud that I'm continuing on even bigger this year with my goal! I have a new goal that I DIDN'T complete last year, that I'm going to work on for this year. I will be telling you all a little about that goal sometime soon!
Happy Gardening Season Everyone!
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