Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Planting Weather

Monday was a busy day around here.  By 1:00 we had completed the house cleaning, the laundry, and a three and a half mile walk. 

1:00 is lunch time.  We take an hour off to eat, to read, and relax.  That's when I read the paper and work some of the puzzles.  Tom reads the paper at breakfast, so he reads his book on his tablet.  

The sky was dark with clouds all day, good weather for setting out plants. 
In the afternoon I got busy outside. I transplanted the tomatoes Tom had grown from seed in the greenhouse. 
 In the raised vegetable beds, I set out sunflower and marigold starts, also grown from seed in the greenhouse.  Then I planted seed for cosmos, asters, and zinnias directly into the soil in the raised beds for the cut flower garden. 
 The dahlias for cut flowers were planted out over month ago.  They are now up and growing. 
 Over where the tulip border was, the gallon cans holding the bulbs have been lifted and stored away in a back corner.  In their place are dahlias started in the greenhouse for a head start. 
While I was planting, Tom made a trip to McClendon's for ingredients to make a new batch of potting soil. 

Back at home, he dug out compost from one of our bins and sifted it. Then he added Perlite.
 Someone gave us most of a brick of coconut fiber.  It takes work to get it loosened from its tightly compressed form.   Coconut fiber is a sustainable substitute for peat moss, sources of which are being depleted.  

This all gets mixed together: two parts compost, one part Perlite, two parts peat moss/coconut fiber. The he stores it in a plastic garbage can. 
 We needed to get the greenhouse emptied so we could use it to store these potting soil materials plus emergency supplies we store in the shed, because Irene was here on Sunday.  It was time for her to set up shop in the shed.

 Irene's Flower Shop is ready for business. 
Today we are expecting rain.  In fact we are hoping for rain.  We need it.  We may have to walk in our rain gear today. 

12 comments:

  1. What a huge garden you have! No wonder it keeps you both so busy! Very impressive, and I can't wait to see the results in the coming months!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow! You mix your own potting soil. I bet your plants love it. I don't dig up my Dahlias, I leave them in the ground. But you have quite a bit more growth on yours already.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It must be nice to be so organized and actually know what you're doing. :) I love Irene's little shop! You and Tom have such a beautiful place.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Your garden work is such a fulfilling passion. I love that Irene seems to be in the family business. And she has her cash register ready, I notice.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Such a cute little shed. My hubby is building one at our new home for his planting and equipment storage.

    ReplyDelete
  6. You really do make it hard on us half hearted gardeners. Your making your own potting soil is so impressive.
    Irene seems to have inherited yours and Tom's super gardener gene.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Lots of labor but what a result. I enjoy following your posts on your gardening.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Beautiful looking garden, impressed by your soil making, labour intensive but well worth it

    ReplyDelete
  9. We only had a few spits of rain yesterday (Tuesday) but today looks much better for it. Looks like you got some yesterday, though. I love that pretty shed, and what a great couple of gardeners you both are. I am still happy with a small 7x23 plot and find it to be plenty of work. :-)

    ReplyDelete
  10. Looks so green there, and your gardens look so neat and tidy! Lots of work! :)

    ReplyDelete
  11. We got some nice rain over here on Tuesday & hope you did too. Your garden looks great and it's nice to see Irene's Flower shop open for business again!

    ReplyDelete
  12. Lucky Irene! I'm so amazed at all the work that you and Tom do. You have such boundless energy. It all looks amazing!

    ReplyDelete

I would love to read your comments. Since I link most posts to Facebook, you may comment there if you do not have an account. I have eliminated Anonymous comments due to spammers.