Pea pods!

Today I harvested one of my favorite treats -- pea pods! Who can stand to let them mature? Who can stand to let them even sit in the harvest basket? I should start going to the garden for lunch...

Trellised Peas And Mystery Plants With Watering Fairies

The fun thing about letting a pack of kids plant your garden with you is all the mystery plants among the rows...

Probably there are a lot of weeds in here, but who can tell!

The Girls' Soybeans and Tomatoes are Sprouting

I am not sure where these will go....

Spinach is up!

Some of our spinach leaves look ready to eat -- if you like baby spinach :). But the best part is watering, of course.

Lots going on....

I'm not sure I'll have the heart to thin these seedlings :( looks like the first planting may come up after all, so we are in abundance now!

Time to stake the peas!

I stopped in to check our progress -- and we've got serious sprouting going on!

Week 3 -- after the re-seed

We planted new seeds last week and we are seeing progress all over -- peas, carrots, spinach, kale! Some of the week1 seeds are probably also up, but I can't tell which they are....

Peas Rising

Watering

Week 1 Check-In

Garden: nothing is growing. The heavy rains revealed a lot of glass chips and gravel mixed with our soil. We scooped and scooped . . . only to see them over and over again. Despite all that, we planted peas, leeks, kale, and broccolini rabe (aka broccoli that went to an IB school).

In-house seedlings: lots of something-or-others seem to be growing. Some of it is weedy or mossy, some of the seed cups are moldy. Sigh.

Rain, Worms, and Seeds

Flash flood warning the same week I put seeds in the ground? Check.

Finding happiness in the arrival of a box of 1000 worms? Check.

Sprouts in my seed starting dishes that are probably moss or weeds? Check.

Arugula Weather

The gardening bug has definitely bitten. I am anxious awaiting the arrival of a Burpee seed shipment and some red wigglers for my worm composter. I didn't plant much of a garden last year, although 2 years ago I did a bit more. I tried worm composting but found that it produced a frustrating abundance of flies. So the worm composter has been sitting unused for a long time, producing vague low-level guilt, and waiting for me to feel up to starting again. I'm not sure exactly what to do to make this time better -- the only tips I've seen involve using more paper, but I suspect the lack of a good seal between my mud room and the outside world is the true culprit.

Last night I tried seeding two flats worth of little peat pots using dirt and seeds I had lying around -- if they don't sprout, at least I've used up the old seeds. I think I picked them up 2 years ago at a post-season sale at Home Depot. We'll see how it goes. I like starting plants from seeds, despite the effort and uncertainty involved, but the minute I walk into a garden store, it sure seems like plants start jumping into my cart. The HP Garden Fair is another form of kryptonite; it is hard to pass up the heirloom & Illinois-hardy varieties that they seem to specialize in. But every time I fork over the same amount for a single plant that I'd pay for a whole packet of seeds, I regret not at least trying to do seedlings.

Today we popped over to the garden to plant a few direct-sow seeds (the intervention of 4 small children tended to negate my careful row-planning, but we may get spinach, peas, arugula, and carrots despite that -- probably in thick clumps and all on top of each other) and attended the general garden meeting. The main items of interest are the coming of new amenities (electricity! porta-potty!) and the potential of establishing more plots by developing another garden. All of the garden people seem to be very nice. Our dirt is in such nice shape that I don't think we will have much to do other than keep the weeds down for the next few days while we wait to see if anything will sprout. The Internets tell me that arugula will sprout in 5 days or so if the weather is in the 40-55 degree range.

Everyone wants it to hurry up and get warm, but now I'm in no hurry. It sounds like Chicago is having arugula weather :).

Seeding

<3 freshly-overturned earth

Winners!

On Wednesday, we got the call from the Garden King: our request to join the 65th/Woodlawn Community Garden was accepted! We were on the waitlist (we're out-of-neighborhood) but a plot freed up and we were offered a spot. I haven't been able to find any information on the gardens closer by, and I have friends at 65th/Woodlawn. The garden has a lot of amenities -- tool shed with lots of equipment, an irrigation system, an established compost system, a firepit, a sandbox, a picnic area with a barbeque, a fence and a gate. I'm told they will have a porta-potty shortly. And it has a Garden King who makes it all work. So, wow! It is really set up perfectly for a family like ours and it's only a few blocks from my office and Stella's new school.

After dance class and some Starbucksian fortification, we hustled on over to sign the agreement and learn about how the garden works. We decided to go ahead and get started, too -- turning over all the dirt, breaking and raking it, mixing in compost, and planting some paperwhite bulbs. David also put the finishing touch on -- stepping stones through the middle. It looks really great. The plot is 10' x 10' or so and although we could probably use 10 times the space, it's a good way to get started. We are starting strong, but as the season wears on we may not find we have the time to keep it up. But the irrigation system will really help with that (unlike my attempts to garden in the front lawn, a weekend trip during a hot spell won't kill my plants). The garden has an agreement with gleaners who will make sure food doesn't go to waste. So excited!