Second year seeds - some good some not.

Behind on blogging again. I think about doing it but with work and home and my new goal of not spending hours on the computer, it's easy to not post anything. I should blog at lunch at work. I'll see if this site is blocked. else I could write it in an email and then copy it over to the blog via phone...

Anyway, It's spring. Kinda. We have snow and even a power outage. Actually that happened right after my last post.  I kept saying "This winter emergency survival test has been brought to you by the Energy Company - PS You failed. Please be more prepared for next year."

I don't do as well with cold once it's been warm. My body wanted the 70F temperature back on the 30s with ice, snow, and wind!  Luckily our power wasn't out for very long because the ice made it hard for us to set up the generator, and we didn't even have batteries for one of our lanterns! We did have a lot of candles though - because I buy them every time they are on sale. I told my husband this is validation of my sale-buys!

I did get my tulips, garlic, and asparagus covered with straw right before it went cold and icy. I don't know if it helped, but they looked good when I uncovered them once it turned warm again. My rhubarb is doing well too but I didn't do anything for that. I gave it some compost a few weeks back... Good thing it's hardy!

Indoors seeds are not quite as predictable this year as they were last.. Some seeds I kept over from last year are doing great. Others are just not popping up.

On the top picture, the last large cell row is supposed to be tomatillos. as you can see I only have one. And on the bottom picture the last row on the right is supposed to be green bell peppers, and again there's one tiny one there...

All the other bell and hot peppers popped - Just not those.  Both these seeds were left over from what I bought in 2014. Maybe that's too long of storage time for how I store...

But the bright note is the all artichokes. That's the top picture left side, second from the bottom (above the lack of tomatillos). These (from burpee) are supposed to produce in the first year - last year the heirloom ones did not appreciate my zone and produced nothing! Honestly,  I am not sure I want to thin them out, I think I'm going to try to transfer them all carefully to bigger pots next month and keep as many as possible. 

The root systems that are going into the water cloth mat under these cells are massive. When I go to transfer some of these plants I'll have to be extra careful. But I'm excited. Should be going into the ground the 3rd of 4th week of april (so soon!). :)

Behind on Blogging - Making Habits is hard.

Yep. So I'm behind on blogging - first week in and already ready to drop it all together.
Which is like so many other items I've tried to pick up, Like...
       -  Running
       -  Weight lifting alone
       -  Daily cleaning
       -  Not eating bread
       -  Reading every day
       -  Drinking Honey-Tea every day
      and sooo many others

But I'm back, trying seeing how this will go.

This last week has be busy. We started upstairs demo to turn an unused room that shares too many walls with the Master into a Laundry room, and to add to the Master's space by taking some of this room's space to make a His and Her's closets

This is the SO laughing at me because I'm afraid of the very nail-y beam, and afraid of using my weight and falling off the ladder.

He one-handedly took this down once I failed... You must admit - there's a lot of scary long nails there!


A good friend came to visit and helped. Prior to taking out most of the drywall we drew pictures on it and took out the carpet. Margerttas and remodeling - a good girls weekend, I'd say. (We did play board and card games later.)

Next update... My Seeds germinated!   And I completely did not turn on my grow lights early enough!

To the right is my tomatoes all popped up. They germinated probably 5 days - except I didn't know this and popped my little plastic green house cover 8 days after planted.

Look at all the poor plants reaching towards the window because I didn't turn on the grow lights soon enough.  But know I know they are up, so lights on!

You are supposed to have a grow light 2-3inches about your new plants, this way they don't stretch themselves out trying to get to the light. Last year, like this one, I let my tomatoes get a bit stretched... Still don't have it perfect yet.

I personally turn off the grow lights when I go to bed 9pm and turn them on when I get up 5am. Some grow with lights on 24 hours, but I want the plants to have a night.  I have no research yet one way or another.

Good info at: http://www.reneesgarden.com/articles/start_seeds.html


Sooo... other items. Work stress, more work stress... and even more work stressed.

But, with all bad things, come good. I got my IPSY bag. Ipsy, is a company that supplies you makeup/beauty samplies (and full size items) based on your complexion, style, and reviews.  It helps me try things I would never, ever, ever, EVER try! Sometimes they are awesome, sometimes not so much. (I'm not very adventurous when it comes to beauty items...)

This month's questionable item. Pink, BRIGHT pink lipstick

Good or Bad?  Yeah, I don't know either. Probably not quite for me, but maybe for another life?

Anyway. Trying to keep up with this Blogging thing. One week at a time.

Weekend Weigh in - 185lbs, Happy

Friday, Saturday, or Sunday - I always step on the scale.

My blood glucose levels are good, cholesterol good, blood pressure good, flexibility good, exercise recovery good... My work has always put together free testing for these numbers.

But still, I'm over weight and have too much fat (literally, not negatively). I've always been over weight... Some years I do well in exercising and watching health and other years, not so much. This year has been on the not soo much side...

My biggest problem is I eat to fulfill my emotions. Sad - eat. Stress - eat. Happy - enjoy food. Want to celebrate - eat. Want to cry - eat. Want to strangle someone? - eat.

http://www.helpguide.org/articles/diet-weight-loss/emotional-eating.htm

The second issue is I'm under motivated to exercise alone... I did ROTC (with a friend in college), Crossfit (with a friend at work), and HipHop dancing class, (because I love dancing and wanted to learn)... but get me alone, an non routine schedule, or something I'm uncomfortable with and all exercise stops.

https://experiencelife.com/article/your-fitness-personality/

There's a lot of information out there on losing weight, being healthy, exercising. But as one podcast put it earlier this week - How much do you really want to change? How important is this to you really?  That doughnut, the tv-show, and so forth are instantly gratifying to you, so if you truly don't want to change, you won't. It's too easy to say Not Now.

My goal - is to continue to be happy, and learn to be healthy. Today I weigh 185 lbs. I've over-eaten for lunch and have yet to exercise. 

After this post. I'm going to do 25 sit-ups, 25 squats, 20 (knee) push-ups, and 30 Jumping-Jacks. 

And then I'm going to make a pie for Pi-Day.

I don't know if I'm going to lose weight while blogging. But I might as well post my weigh-ins and moods.

Pepper & Tomato Planting - The first of many

This year I'm going for 6 types of peppers, 2 types of tomatoes, 1 artichoke type, and 1 tomatillo type...

If you look at my last blog post and count the rows up, you'll notice that I don't have enough rows for all these plants.  SO! The true first step of starting seed germination... COUNT... Whoops. Skipped that. Fixed now.

Back to Germination. Tomatoes, Artichoke, and Tomatillos are easy for germination - Plant in the loose, seed beneficial soil, keep warm (65-80F), and moist.

Now, seed soil should allow drainage so not to cause rot... Do Not Use Planting Soil... If you want, you can make your own, use the expanding seed soil pods, or whatever else (I've read some people using paper) - just do some research prior to experimenting.  Most seed starting mixes use peat moss or coir (back to drainage) and then cooked compost (150F to kill pathogens) and then maybe some vermiculite or perlite (drainage again).  Get the picture?

Honestly, it's funny that soil needs all that drainage so  so the seeds and baby plants don't rot, and yet the next important step is moisture/watering... (The third most important temp... but I'm sure your house isn't lower than 60F... and if you are growing in an outside greenhouse = heater)

ANYWAY.

Place seeds in seed starting soil per normal direction for Tomatoes, Artichokes, Tomatillos, Etc.

Peppers, I pre-soak. Always have, always will... It helps germination for me - Supposedly it softens the shell, starts the germination process... or something...

Either way. My method.  Set up cups for how many types of seeds you have. Place Hot (85-100F) water into cups.

Add Seeds and then soak for 8 hours. Check temp and if water cools below 75F, drain (till 1/4-1/8 left with seeds in) and re-fill with hot water (85-100F) as needed.

Then plant in cells or flats and keep moist! (Depends on your system on how you water.)

Doesn't this just say YAY Spring!???