wearin' o' the green

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!  We have no nasty emerald beer for you, but everything else here is coming up green!  This weekend saw some big activity in the garden!  Time to get spring planting underway.  Most of our seedlings are getting up to a point where they are nearly ready to be placed in the ground.

assorted seedlings

tomatoes

 Speaking of the ground, a lot of clearing, shoring up and planting happened today after harvesting the rest of the broccoli.  We also transplanted the brussel sprouts and they are none too happy with the arrangement.  Speaking of greens though, you do know that the leaves from these two brassicae can be boiled just like collards, kale or other greens for a delicious veggie dish full of vitamins.  Absolutely delicious!

The tomatoes move in to the much needed real estate in the ground plot in about a week though so rather than just pull and toss, we are going to try to salvage in buckets.  We have quite an aphid situation right now with the brussel sprouts.  Might be time to call in the ladybugs!

broccoli and brussel sprouts before harvest 

happy little broccoli

we are so pissed at you right now

Ready for the spring crops to grow

So into the ground went sprouted corn, summer squash, kamo kamo and four types of melon seed.  Earlier this week we sprouted three types of bush bean and two types of pea, inoculated the sprouts with nitrogen fixing bacteria to help both plants and soil.  Those went into the ground along with seedlings for two types of eggplant, lipstick pepper, and tomatillo.  Meanwhile, mounds for 10 varieties of heirloom tomatoes (did I mention how much we love tomatoes) were built and the entire plot covered in bird netting once again.  Whew!

As for other plans, the cucumbers this year we are going to attempt planters that we can move as needed to help the plants with our hot summer sun.  Two hardy varieties this year.  And then there are the plans for the outer edges of the lawn.  Watermelons (two varieties), the infamous zucchino rampicante, casabanana, sunflowers, and two varieties of pumpkin will go into mounds along the fence line and shrubs where we will train the vines to trellis and grow along the property boundary.  The pumpkins went in today.

doesn't look like much right now, but just you wait for the pumpkin patch

Here's some of what's going on elsewhere in the yard and garden as well.  We have quite a few things coming along!  Not pictured are all of the citrus trees in bloom right now that smell absolutely intoxicating.  Orange blossom has got to be the most beautiful smell on earth.  Let's hope all of the blooms this year and the abundance of bees around our yards mean we will have a bumper crop of citrus.

potatoes doing great, 3 kinds

root crops and lettuce coming along slowly

strawberries

small but delicious

blackberries getting bigger and ready for trellis

chard and a volunteer squash

zatar oregano, rosemary and thyme

white sage, black sage, lavender and lemonade berry in the front yard

Quite a stroke of work done, and still quite a bit to go, but things are all coming up green and beautiful already.  Soon we'll be putting together the hanging planters for the cherry tomatoes, seeding up more herbs for the herb garden and kitchen, and getting the tomatoes into their mounds.  Even the brussels sprouts seem to be forgiving after such a rude move earlier.  Sun down and they seem to have sprung back just fine.  It's going to be a great green year!

okay, we'll forgive you this time