Sunny Morning with a touch of clothes

I did the last of my pre-seeding last weekend and we moved most things out to the greenhouse except for the newest seed. But I like going in there - it is green and beautiful.

It has been really cloudy and rainy for the last several weeks and freezing at night. However, for the last 2 days it has been really sunny. The asparagus stayed just above the soil and did nothing until the sun hit us. Now it is ready to harvest.

For the last year, it has been has been our goal to get a clothes line up outside. There used to be one , but it was in the middle of the area we wanted to build a playset in (and in the shady part of the yard). Mike put the new one up yesterday. This morning I am hanging up our first load of clothes - I am delighted as it makes a big environmental difference.Only your furnace and air conditioner use more energy, and our dryer is an old green 70s number with no energy star advances. Check out the how much energy your appliances use in this info graphic by GE.

We'll need to see how often we use it. It will mean that Mike has to do more laundry (I can't do 4 loads on a Saturday when 1 fits on the clothesline), and that we may need to iron some things. My biggest concern, however, is cat hair. The dryer usually removes it, so we'll have to see if the wind can do the same. I put the load this morning out just before 8, so it will be interesting to compare the efficiency of the solar power to my clothes dryer.

Mike also added the sign the girl's made for me to the greenhouse. We'll see how all that wood does in the weather, but I love having it there. All in all, it's a beautiful morning.

No Longer Green

In my last post, I gloated over the fact that we did not get Calgary's snow. In retrospect, I may have been tempting fate a little. It's already May and today we had blowing snow all day. It makes me feel like banging my head against my greenhouse wall, but since that thin glass is the only thing protecting my baby plants, I think I'll refrain.

This photo is a picture of my yard on May 15th last year. I had planted my corn, and was protecting it with a row cover. It doesn't quite seem right to have a late season snow just as I am getting ready to plan. What if I keep tracking and find out that I always get snow in May when I want to plant. 

I have had cold hardy stuff in the greenhouse for a couple of weeks, but everything else is still in the grow table or the window boxes. Tonight is the first night we are heating the greenhouse. Last year we were heating by the first of May and had a much wider variety of plants out (see photo right). However, we spent too much heating the greenhouse and we are trying to avoid that this year.

Finally green

Last week I was at Teela's helping out with the birth of her new baby girl, Viola. While we were waiting (Viola was a few days late), Teela's son Merlin and I did some potting in Teela's screened porch. I also got to see azaleas in bloom and Merlin and I walked through a beautiful botanical garden. All this green and the plus 25 degree weather had me hankering to garden.

It snowed in Saskatoon while I was gone, but it was only raining when I cam home, and the grass had finally greened up. A number of trees are budding and my perennials had grown while I was gone.

It continued to rain most of the week, but we handily avoided the blizzard that struck Calgary.


 By yesterday, I was gardening even if it was raining and windy. I have good rain pants and a sold rain jacket, so I headed out into the yard and weeded my flower beds.

While I was there, I discovered so many exciting spring things. My asparagus is up and we'll get to eat it soon. The spinach and chard I planted in one of the square foot beds have also sprouted and I ate some of the spinach in the greenhouse. there is so much of it that I am putting it on the menu this week. My chives are starting to bud and I ate one.

All this weeding encouraged me to do some potting and seeding today. I seeded all the gourds and squashes (about 5 days later than I would have liked, but oh well). I also re potted cucumbers, artichokes and tomatoes. Some of my peppers are even flowering, so Mike fertilized the flowers by hand. Even though it was a high of nine and it rained of and on, I felt great.

Mike put some covers on a few of my beds so what I can get them really growing quickly, and I planted the astible and some lilies. I still have a few in the greenhouse and they are getting ready to flower, so I am hoping for some sun!

• Check out all the pics of the yard at the start of May