Thursday, May 6, 2010

Rain and things to do

Its raining lightly this morning. When the little one takes her nap, i'm going to go out and spread the slug, snail & earwig bait.

Oh, my leg hurts so bad today. I think the weather and over doing it yesterday are the culprits. Its almost like being punished.
But since it is raining out, i won't be feeling like i should be out there trying to do things. But i'm sure i can find things that need doing in here that can be done while seated.
Like getting the Paeonia  anomala seeds started.  And i have to decide what i am going to do with those Goji  seedlings.  I think i got 100% germination out of those berries and the seedling are in clumps.

I also need to resow a few of my flats where germination has been sparse.

I also have other seeds that need starting...annuals.

I am having no luck with the sweet pepper seeds i planted. The old 'fooled you' Jalapeno seeds did sprout and the seedlings are doing well.  The Chiltepin peppers are no-shows. But those are old seeds. I am a bit annoyed with the Zsa-zsa sweet pepper seeds. Not a one sprouted. At all. It has been warm enough in the greenhouses, so i don't know what the deal is. But i'm going to try again. I guess it won't be too bad if i have to go to the local nursery this year to get sweet pepper seedlings.

We may get some rather cold nights over the weekend. The forecast is saying 34 degree overnights for Sunday and Monday.
This tells me that it is not a bad thing to not have some seedlings in the garden right yet.  I think the GrowVeg database is off by maybe a week ot two.  The thing is that since they don't have the last frost date data for my actual town, they use the closest town to me, which is just on the edge of the Zone 5a/b border.   My town and actual yard are firmly within Zone 5b according to this map .
I guess bottom line is that their estimate is about as accurate as any one else's guess for weather at this time of year..so i won't fret about not having things done according to the schedule they offer. Although i'd really like to have these things scheduled down to the letter, i know it doesn't work that way.

I got my order confirmation from Amishland seeds, she takes about 5 days for turnaround during her busy season, i don't know if this time of year is still busy for her. I would think things start to slow down for seeds about now since we, out at the far point of the northeast, are coming within 4 weeks of setting out our tenderest plants and most of those were started from seed at least a week ago. Unless you are late!  So i figure the soonest i will get my seeds is next week, since she is in Pennsylvania, the seeds won't be traveling too far once they hit the post office.

I think i am going to try and make plant markers with some old Sculpey clay that i have.  I bought it on clearance at Staples a number of years ago for less than half price. I bought 4 boxes of 1.75 pounds each. I only got to use one box, it is white so i was thinking i could sculpt then paint it,  but i never got to use the rest...
But i think i could make a few blank plaques out of it, using my pasta machine to get a consistent thickness and impress some patterns onto the edges, then bake them.  I could use them flat on the soil as tiles or i could epoxy the plaques to some cut-up clothes hanger wire and use them as stakes.  I don't know if i should write the plant names on them after baking, or if i should scraffito them in... or use colored clays to embellish them...  I think for the tomato plants  i could make gift tag style markers and just tie them to the base of the vines.  I'm going to know what is where pretty well by reminding myself with my GrowVeg plan,  but the rest of the family might not. I might get as many as 10 plaques out of each box if i make them 4"x5". I don't know, i'll see what i have time to do. Plenty of ideas and materials, but so little time.

My dad stopped by with another load of loam/compost. This load is for the yard itself, so hubby has some hope of growing a lawn.  The ground  is mostly sand right now and there is nothing to help anything grow, so a couple loads of nice dark dirt will put a few inches of topsoil down and grass might get to grow.

Oh,  and one of my horseradish roots have sprouted....

2 comments:

Faith said...

At the dollar store last year they were selling some fake stone markers with names of herbs on them. They only had four versions, and I would have bought all they had when they went on sale. They were really cool!

They were palm-sized, flat-bottomed, mostly smooth ovals, just a little roughness so they would look like a gray smooth stone you'd find in a river, and the name prettily written across the top. You just set them in the dirt at the base of your plant.

I tried to find them online just now, to show you quickly, but instead I found that when I typed in 'stone plant markers' lots of people were using actual stones and permanent markers. I might do that, because I really like the fake carved stones I have, but only have four. It would be really cool to have all my stuff labeled.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with using the Sculpy.

~Faith

icebear said...

I think i have seen something like them at the Dollar Tree up here. I think they were common herbs and they looked cute.

I thought about using real stones, i think maybe you had a picture of one, maybe your Rosemary?
But with the real stones i was wondering what to use to write on them, Sharpies fade especially the colored sharpies. I think a paint marker would work well.
I just remembered that i have a whole box of 4x4" square, glazed tiles in the shed. It was something i picked up at the free pile at the Transfer/Recycle station (aka DUMP). I might do something with those. I think they would take a paint marker... and i wouldn't run out of tiles before i mark all my plants. I won't have enough Sculpey for all my veggies. But if i ever put together a small, orderly herb garden, the Sculpey might be the best thing to use.
Indecision.. its why the things i don't do don't get done! lol