Surprises

The garden continues to surprise.

On Monday we found flowers on the potatoes. This made Brother and Pooka both very happy since it has to bloom and then it will die back and we will have blue potatoes. Pooka decided that they were very pretty flowers as well. I will admit it is a nice pop of color now.

Blue potato flowers

Then Tuesday I walked past the green easter basket of marigolds. These were planted in "extra" dirt from holes where we planted or seed starters that didn't start. What did I see? Two possible squash plants. I am trying to decide if they are zucchini or the mystery squash, but surprise there are extra plants. Now to move them to something else and then probably restart the marigolds. Again.

Is it Zucchini or mystery squash

This morning, I was doing my morning walkdown of the garden and I found a caterpillar on one of the tomato plants. I didn't have the camera so I didn't get a picture of it, but I did have Pooka grab her bug house and we collected him. My preliminary research is saying this is an armyworm that turns into a moth. I am not sure we are going to let him live in captivity, but he is not going on the tomato plants again.

Not the best picture, but it shows he has probably been out there a while.

All the seeds are done

I am officially calling it. I think I finally have all the seeds in dirt. If I don't we don't need whatever I forgot.

First I really needed to get the Blue Corn in the ground on Sunday morning. That's right, I said blue corn.

Blue corn

 Aunt Pooka gave us these seeds since she knew both kids would love them. Brother is nominally responsible for them. He loved seeing what the corn would look like once we pulled the seeds out of the packet. There were only 7 in there, so we won't get much, but this should be a good indicator on if it works and if we like it. If both hold true, I can buy more next year.

the corn

I was worried I wouldn't have anything the right size to pot them in, until I remembered that the city gave us this GIANT new recycling bin, so our old ones are empty (and they didn't cost anything), so we repurposed it into a corn pot. This will also give us room to plant some green beans in the 3 sisters method of planting. I don't think I will be putting any squash in it, but 2 out of 3 sisters isn't too bad.

Free pot holding our corn

On Sunday we also had to get the romaine lettuce going. I Know it may be a bit past the start date for the romaine, but its worth at try. The packet didn't have a planting date on it, so we are going to plant and see what happens. I would really like some lettuce I don't have to convince the kids they like. Since I didn't have any space in the ground (and I wanted to make sure it lived) we put the romaine in baskets that I have hung on hooks around the planting beds. I bet the neighbors think they will finally see flowers. They will be very confused later.


Hopefully we will get romaine

Lastly, I thought I was done, but with the front bed nearing completion, I realized I didn't have any dill plants or cumin. I guess it all died off when I wasn't looking. I swear my brain is useless lately. Pooka and I replanted those into these red pots to go on the front porch until I find a better home.  In the little red watering can are some marigold seeds I promised Pooka she could plant after her egg plants died. And really, marigolds can be eaten in salads and things, so who knows, maybe we will try that this summer.

Cumin, dill, and marigolds

Easter Bunny left PLANTS?

Another holiday and more new ways for Pooka to think and learn about science. The Easter Bunny came on Sunday and left Pooka with a bug viewer, a bug house, a Pooka sized wheel barrow ("becuase we need to move mulch around Mommy") and 5 ceramic eggs. Brother even recieved an egg.


Surprise More plants... Just what Daddy wanted.

After some closer inspection from Pooka, we learned the eggs came with seeds inside them. They were set up to grow seeds straight inside these eggs. Pooka was so excited, but we waited until Monday to plant them. Pooka and I were way too worn out Sunday to try.


Seed filled eggs

Monday afternoon Pooka and I sat down and read the directions. Fortunatly, it was easy as knock the top off the egg, water and set in a sunny place. I love easy directions like this. It did say you may need to replant them once they get bigger, but it is a start.

Now missing the top

I will say getting the tops broken off was a bit harder then I originally thought it would be. We did kill one of the eggs in such a way it no longer held its contents and it got dumped into the grow um's muffin pans. Then you get to pull little bits of ceramic out of the egg so the seeds can grow.

Time to clean out the egg.

 Next you water it. It didn't say how much to water it, so it was a bit of a guessing game and it wasn't easy. In retrospect, I should of used a turkey baster instead of a glass. It worked, if a bit messy.

Egg has now been watered

For now, I have the eggs in the muffin tin (the extra egg got put in another tin). The tin of eggs I then put in one of our very full windows. Fortunatly, I had a shelf stander in one, and they fit on the bottom of the shelf which means they are not taking up too much space. But if it means Pooka and Brother get more snapdragons (The yellow eggs), and pansy (purple eggs) and marigolds (the blue eggs) then its worth it. Maybe I will let the 2 of them have one big pot to plant it all in. If we can find space for another pot. But that is an issue for another day.

Now to see if they grow