Hello friends!
Some green for spring!
Dahlia seedlings are growing and looking good!
I have some at all stages - some still their first leaves some 6" tall and 10" wide. No, not sprouted at all the same time. I'm pleased with what I see and totally curious what I will get out of these.
Having an afternoon cuppa and a break. I've been mending my mountain of ripped out seams, buttons and hems. I also have been doing some thinking as I sew. Laundry is continuing (when does that ever end?!) slowly, decided to spring clean the bedding today. Well, some of it.
Once this is out of my hair then I will work at putting seeds away, pull out the next ones to plant and look at my seed saving lines. I need to see how many doubles I had planned originally and wonder if I'll have two of those tubers sprouting. I think said tubers are rebelling right now and saying way too cold right now - like don't make me think about sprouting you crazy gardener.
Not dahlias I know, but my tomatoes are looking good! I've done something I read here which is pull off the heat and put in a taller pot and keep burying the plant right up to the leaves so I have been doing so. I'm hoping these don't look super leggy when all is said and done. That's been my issue in the past. Might as well try something new and make a better practice. All of my seed types I planted out have now sprouted. Yay!
So things are growing here and looking alright I think! Next is snow, they said this afternoon but it's sunshiny to my south and dark gray blue to my north. Go figure!
I just came up from the basement after taking notes on all of my seedlings and after saving seed from 32 seed parents, I ended up with only 5 seed parents making 32 seedlings. So not a huge mix as I was hoping, but you never know where the bees were prior to their visit to make the seeds, so I look forward to some nice surprises!
The seedlings are looking healthy and in good shape. Yay for that.
I had a bunch of named varieties with shoots up this morning so back under the lights those moved and moved the next bunch of pots upstairs to the hut and will see if they sprout soon too. I think things have just been too cold and they are like "not having any of it!"
I ran to Menards today and grabbed the additional lily and will add star fighter to the mix. So some lights and darks. I just wish I knew how to correctly drift my bulbs so they created some visual shape with a few bulbs. I don't have the huge amounts to plant and hope they will kind of make new bulbs with time. Any suggestions?
I didn't get the rest done I had hoped for this evening. Instead I allowed myself to get sucked into a few shows on HGTV. How do these people have a mortgage and can also spend 200k to renovate a few rooms? I guess I'm just really aware of money and strangely how people lots younger than I that can do this and I can't and I couldn't at that age either. It always makes me wonder what they must do to be able to afford such. I try not to watch this channel much anymore as it does become a downer for me in a short period of time. Heck, I'm still feathering my nest with second hand even at this stage. And this is why I don't watch anymore. I always feel destitute.
So tomorrow bare roots and seeds. And checking for more sprouts. Getting ready for snow which means I need to go pick up the yard of the crap kid2 left out there. The only thing I look forward to is having bright green grass when the snow leaves. And hopefully more rain to follow. And then a warm up would be nice and get the planting season underway.
☘️The leprechaun sprints through today! Maybe we can all find a pot of gold somewhere today. ☘️
The hubs and I are up early to get Irish breakfast underway. It's one way we share the holiday with the kids. We honeymooned in Ireland and would have traditional breakfast each day and it's a nice reminder of our travels and I need to learn yet how to make corned beef for dinner (of which I read is not really an Irish thing) I generally will make my Guiness Beef Stew instead, I've also tried colcannon making. I got my Irish brown bread done last night. It did make the house smell good.
Today I will go through the hut and see what I have for eyes. I know there were a few that looked like nothing has cropped up and I have plenty of extra tubers who have been warmer on the first floor and bring out eyes. Of course I'll have to sort through the crate because I just dumped stuff in so it's not in any order.
The seedlings are looking good, I have everything pinched as can be. Some of the plants are floppy but so be it. As their stems get stronger that changes and they can take off.
And everything else growing - I will be taking stuff off the heat mats. And contemplate what is next to start. I have bare roots to get planted, some lily bulbs to get in the ground and need to take time to figure out what will be going where. From the flower beds to the gardens. Time to get spring moving in the right direction and march winter on out of here.
I'm hoping to see leaves on the tubers today and get ready to start moving stuff around and completed. I'll be glad to have everything growing and then out of the house. With time I'll get there!
So my first shoot for the year off a tuber is above the soil line! Woot! And it happens to be one of my seedlings from 2023. Just checked my list and it was one that never bloomed last year but it's sending up a fat old shoot. Good for it!
I wasn't going to check the 50 or so pots I brought upstairs but my curiosity has gotten the better of me and I sat on the floor and went through the first 14 on the bottom shelf - lots of eyes ready to explode! Yay! Most of these on the bottom shelf are either my seedlings or I brought up the new to me varieties and put them on the bottom just in case they have gall issues, when I water it would hit the cardboard underneath. No dripping onto other pots.
In my check, I have some that don't look like they have eyes as some of the spots weren't totally bursting like a zit, and they had what I thought could be an eye but unless I take off my glasses and then stick them up to my eyes, I can't really tell. I should have done what one of the dahlia friends here does - pull out my loupe to look, but I tucked my loupe away for safe keeping from kid2 when younger and well, it has been in a pretty safe spot for years. 
I need to go out to the garage and see if I have the last bale of promix. I bought bare roots today. My region had a craptastic display at HD barely anything in spring bulbs and so dry you could probably use for dahlia raisins if there was ever such a thing. Went to Walmart, found bleeding hearts, lily (asiatic), a peony and the dahlias were meh in what I was looking for. Then we stopped at the Menards and I ended up grabbing two packages of oriental lilies. I'm unsure if I'll like these or not, I hate Easter lilys, but maybe outside they will be nice and lovely. Will see. I bought ones with polkadots. Not sure they'll be as named but I'll try and see what I get.
Got home and checked the basement as well. I added more dirt to the tomatoes as every couple of days I bury that stem up to the leaves so they still look horribly small. Had to replant one seed that I got here from a blogging garden friend because once sprouted it has kept its seed head on its leaves like it's protecting itself from the world. But we are now almost to the top of the pots so burying as far as I can and soon I'm out of space. Which then that means, these plants have grown 4-5" in a week and a half. Now hoping they are the heartiest buggers ever.
As for the dahlias - the bulk of the seedlings have been pinched. I have about 8 to do but they need to get larger and heartier with more leaf sets and off they come. This year they are behaving fairly well w the pinching, so that is good. Not too much drama from them.
Also found in the basement is that the liatris is now all up. I bought those when I was last at Menards. So nice to see the sharp green points coming out of the ground so springy. I hope they do well where I'll plan to stick them. I'm trying build up my south side with pollinator perennials by my front porch. I have hyssop (that doesn't want to take off, it's so tiny yet!), blanket flower, coneflowers and then at the end the lily's, rhubarb and daylilies that never amount to anything. So maybe I'll clump them all together and they can take off. My plan for that side is to load the front section with finished compost. It's the world's lousiest fried and dried soil. So maybe it will take off w amended love to it and finally do well. I have been focused on the dahlia bed and garden boxes and have run out of compost before I can add it to this section so this year I will try.
Whew - lots to do and I don't even have all my plants - as in my annuals that I will buy in late April. My house is filling on up quickly.
I have the hubs tasked to see if I have one more promix bale in the garage he can bring in for me. He's got to go help kid2 pump tires up as it's time to start trolling the neighborhood with summer bike rides! Yes I know I was going to go look but they got outside before I did. It's a good job for them both.
Happy green thumbs!
Good mornin!
Today's big task is finishing up the named tuber plant up. I have about 15 left to do. I'd say 1/2 of what I have planted had eyes, sprouts etc. longer sprouts I plucked off. Little bursting eyes I have left alone and I guess the rest are wait and see what they do under the lights. The initial ones are all tugging back, good sign, but that doesn't guarantee green growth above the soil line.
Once that behemoth job is done, I'll plant some more annuals, see if anything can come off the heat, give a drink to everything.
And then maybe I'll sit and noodle my garden layouts. Not only the dahlias, but the other beds as well. I am hoping the stores near me get their bare roots out. It's like pulling teeth when each store will put their stock out! Last year 3/4 of them had stuff out March 1. The rest by st pats day. This year 1/4 of the stores have stuff out. That would be menards. Walmart, HD and Farm and Fleet - you're killing me! I don't know why all plant stuff can't be out by March 1 in my area. Yes I get stuff can freeze, don't keep it in the stores entry (HD I give you the stink eye). I get you might want to sell houseplants then, but rearrange your stores. Some of us like to get plants started before tucking them in the ground. I'm one of those and I'd prefer them out before the first of spring. Maybe I'm in the minority about wanting plant material. It allows me to plan what's going where and guarantee I have stuff on hand.
It's 6:20am and already 50°. Though I'm delighting in these temps I also know it can spawn wicked weather, reminds me of the huge storm and warm ups about 10 years ago where the first of May was 100-105°. Serious damage to the region when the storms came. I see this happening again. It also means if that does happen I won't see what my irises will do. And I bought new ones! I didn't need new ones of those either. Hah.
So I'm trying to refrain from heading out and cleaning up fall/winter. I know the weather can snap back to freezing and heavy snow. And with st pats coming up, that sprightly Saint always sends the opposite weather to what we have been having leading up to it. I've always been taught not to plan events that weekend because they will forever change but quick. I call it his last laugh with winter. Either it's been super crappy and we have a huge warmup, but more than likely a cold and blizzard out of no where. ☘️
Well, need to get the kids moving and ready for the school day. They can and will all go and I'll head to finish the planting! Yay!
