Walk Awaaaay From the Computer

Sometimes, no matter how mountainous the piles, no matter how voluminous the dust bunnies, no matter how numerous the emails, when a person opens the door to personally receive the mail from the mailman and feels not a blast of icy air but gentle warmth and gets a whiff of not brisk or crisp, but soft and dirt, they need to walk awaaay from the computer and go outside to play in the garden.

Then things like peas, swiss chard, spinach, mesclun, arugula and whatever else one grabs from the seed box will, like magic, begin to appear from the dark loam of the earth and become a meal or ten for a family or a boat.

I do believe that we will have fresh greens and vegetables even for our first sail this year.  In part this has to do with planning (and giving in to the impulse to get out in the garden all the while ignoring the piles that will still be there when I come back inside).  In part this is due to excellent husbands who help build cold frames.  Lastly, we must give a nod to Mother Nature who seems to not have any more snow in our future this spring.  I may have spoken too soon and you can blame me if snow arrives, but I with cautious optimism, think we just might be done.

Here, you can see four different season extenders.  In the foreground are milk jugs with the bottoms removed and then plunked in the ground over pea seeds.  In the background, from left to right is the angled cold frame, a hooped bed which will receive plastic over the hoops and an a-frame cold frame.  All work equally well.

Annie
Counting the days until my first garden greens of the season