Finally, winter has left the building; see ya next January. The grass deepened three shades of green over the weekend, and the outdoor furniture assumed its usual configuration on the deck.
Fueled by a cappuccino made with
Full Steam Coffee Co.'s Perfect Storm beans, I headed out for a 1.5 hour walk Saturday morning in preparation for the
Eco-Endurance Challenge next weekend. My previous plan of running 5k and doing Power Yoga with Rodney Yee everyday to get ready for this long ago fell by the wayside with the very uninspiring wet, gloomy, April showers.
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| in training |
The forecast for the day of the event is now back to sunshine and 12C which means I will probably be able to wear my well broken-in Adidas trail runners (with bread bags inside for crossing streams) for the 8 hour jaunt in the woods. The purpose of today's walk was to make sure my feet could love them long time.
After my training walk, I went out into the greenhouse for the afternoon to plant some seeds. Two weeks ago I placed an online order with Annapolis Seeds, and on Friday they arrived in the mail: peppers, tomatoes, tomatillos, eggplant, squash, cucumbers, peas, and beans. This great little company, in it's 5th year of operation, only sells open-pollination and non-genetically modified seeds.
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| seed order |
I really don't know if it's too early or not to plant seeds in the greenhouse; this is a grand experiment (one more thing on which to exercise optimism). The chill is gone from the air, so hopefully seedlings will soon spring forth.
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| planted |
As well, Cheryl, Brian, and a case of wine were here for the weekend; Daniel grilled lamb and roasted potatoes for dinner on Saturday evening. The lamb was legendary; Cheryl even ate it.
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| grilled lamb, roasted potatoes, Greek salad |
Sunday was the most beautiful day of the year so far, so we spent the morning having lunch on the deck and getting some vitamin D.
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| scallops in rum sauce for lunch |
Things were finally dry and warm enough for us to go up on the roof of the kitchen and seal up the skylight leak that evolved over the winter.
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| Cheryl supervising from deck |
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| view from aloft on the kitchen top |
And here's what we were doing this time last year:
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I started my peppers in the greenhouse on May 2nd last year. It took close to a month for them to germinate out there, and because of that, I didn't get any peppers at all before frost. They really need heat to thrive. They should be started the first week of April in the house (heated from below). If you start them indoors now, move them to the greenhouse later, and keep them there to extend the season, you probably have much better results than I did last year.
ReplyDeleteI had some pepper seeds left over from last year, so I planted them the first of April and kept them on the heated floor in the spare bedroom. This time they only took 1 week for them to pop up out of the soil. They all have their first true leaves now, and I'll be putting them in the greenhouse soon.
Your tomatoes will be a month behind too, but I don't know if they need as much heat as the peppers do. I think they'll be fine in the greenhouse. I'll keep checking your blog to see how they do.
-Amy S