I have had one of those weeks. I was on a business trip until Thursday. (It was very successful! But long.) Then I came down with a sinus infection that is still kicking my butt this weekend. I am trying to take it easy and rest. Yesterday I took a two hour nap, hence the lack of a Saturday Farmer’s Market on actual Saturday, but sitting out on my balcony mixing soil, transplanting things, and fertilizing plants was exactly what I needed today. Plus, I took LOTS of pictures for you.
This is what the balcony looks like right now. There’s still a little bit more room for expansion, which is good because we have three tomato plants still inside under the grow light! Thankfully we’ll have room for those and a few more herb disks. Speaking of herb disks – Johnny’s Seeds has a customer for life. I called them on Friday because our cress is turning yellow and there was no information about it online. No one seems to have that problem. So I called the help line and I was on the phone for about twenty minutes while the woman researched their cress and finally gave me a suggestion saying that if it didn’t work, to please call back. So we transplanted the cress into a bigger pot and gave it lots of water (but not too much!), so hopefully it perks back up.
This was my big project last weekend! I bought a bunch of succulents and I put them in this letter holder that my friend bought me as a house warming present. We don’t get a lot of mail, so I wanted to do something with it that would be useful and interesting and I finally figured it out! I love this as a succulent planter and I’m just so so happy with it. One the spiny ones had a branch fall off, so I’m trying to grow it back up:
He’s already perked up a bit and straightened out! He was leaning over slightly. I just think this is the cutest little thing ever.
While I do enjoy the thrill of growing plants from seed (I mean, there’s nothing better than finally seeing them sprout up!), I also like the instant gratification of buying plants that are already started. I bought this celosia and this lovely smelling grapefruit mint plant at Lowes last weekend. Celosia is so cool looking and apparently you can eat it. The grapefruit mint does in fact smell like grapefruit. I think I might put some in a smoothie or two today.
Remember what my lettuce looked like two weeks ago? You couldn’t even see them, so I circled the seedlings. They are getting bigger and bigger! There were a few that were crowding each other, so I plucked those yesterday and soon I’ll have to thin these again.
Finally, barely visible, are the swiss chard we planted last weekend! I’m so excited for these to come up, because they are very brightly colored and pretty. And, hopefully, tasty.
I never really thought of myself as someone who would enjoy gardening as much as I do. Like with most things in my life, I feel like I have to have a little success to really feel attached to it, and we have been successful in a lot of ways. I love to get my hands (and feet) dirty on our little balcony. I love mixing our own potting soil, keeping the plants healthy, trying to solve problems that appear. We’ve started keeping a record of everything we are doing so that when next year rolls around, we’ll know when we planted things and what worked, and what failed spectacularly.
So tell me, how does your garden look today?
This is one of those posts that just won’t write itself. I keep getting bogged down in the plot summary, when really all I want to do is post my favorite quotes from this novel and let you decide. It’s pretty, and I truly enjoyed reading about the characters, but it is flawed.
