Saturday, March 28, 2009

Seed sprouting

We're trying something new this year by sprouting our own heirloom seeds for the garden. This fall we ordered some heirloom seeds online in hopes of saving seeds from the garden. Hopefully this will let us be a bit more self-sufficient instead of going to the garden center and buying plants every year. Also, there just seems to be something wrong with hybrid seeds or plants that grow a vegetable that can't every grow again without another hybrid seed provided by the seed company.

We set up some shelves in a heated room in our barn with some full-spectrum florescent lights. We also cranked up the heater in that room to make sure it was warm enough for the seeds to sprout. So far, so good. Our cat Lily doesn't seem to mind that it's even warmer in that room now than it was before either! Some are growing so well that we'll have to transplant sooner than we thought.

A start on next winter

Just as soon as we survive one winter, we have to start to prepare for the next! The last couple of weekends, we worked on splitting our firewood for next season. Our neighbor was nice enough to let us borrow his wood splitter again.

Last weekend we had a few friends out to help, and this weekend we did some more, giving us about 1/2 of the wood we'll need for next year. Our efforts will be cut short a bit this weekend with some early Spring snow scheduled. A couple more sessions and we should be all ready for next winter!

Sunday, March 15, 2009

The return of some old friends

Things are changing quickly in our neck of the woods. The last couple of weeks have marked the return of some of our old friends. The sandhill cranes, robins and red-wing blackbirds have all returned for the season. It's great to see these sure signs of spring in the air!