seed, soil, and string

Absolutely nothing was accomplished in the studio this weekend. Instead, I spent my time during the little peeks of sunshine playing in the soil. It was lovely.

I feel I must apologize to my Midwest friends and family who will read this and hate me as today they are expecting a couple of inches of snow, but, here in southern Oregon it is time for planting lettuce, spinach, onions, and carrots.

Even with a short west coast winter I was sill climbing the walls this year. My 80 year-old gardening neighbor agreed with the claw-mark inducing weather we've had, as he handed advice and a few extra garlic cloves over the fence, and checked on the 'Egyptian walking onions' he gave me last fall. I am always excited about any plant that walks or flings itself into unexpected an unplanned places. I'd much rather weed volunteer dill seedlings than grass, and I believe that our dear Mother N. has quite an excellent sense of vegetative composition. I'm looking forward to watching these onions walk like an Egyptian.

With rows marked and watered, I then brought my dirty fingernails inside, and started my brandywine and roma tomatoes, tomatillos, oregano (I could not find a single organic oregano plant to put in my garden last year. Oregonians don't like oregano!?), and leeks.

Yes, these are toilet paper rolls. Gayla Trail details how to make these perfect seed starter homes in her You Grow Girl blog. I cut my rolls in half, as all of my tomatoes will be replanted into larger containers before they venture beyond my living room window and into the Great Outdoor Garden, the dream every tomato seed.