Good news, everyone

First the small victory: I'm growing barley grass for my dog to eat and the seeds have sprouted and are growing really fast. They are still under plastic wrap right now, but tomorrow I'll probably have to take that off. The directions said it would take 8-10 days but it's been much shorter than that.

A tasty dog treat, apparently. 

Now the bad news: I think the aloe plant I'm trying to nurse back to health is getting worse. I accidentally left it out in the rain and I think it got too much water. It's inside now, so hopefully after a while it will recover. 

And the very good news: I'm trying direct sewing with seeds this year. I had no idea if it would work, but I wanted to try an experiment. Then the rain started. It's been stormy and wet, and I've tried very hard to keep the soil in my containers from getting waterlogged. But I was worried it was too wet for them and too windy and that the seeds wouldn't go anywhere and I'd have to just buy seedlings.

Then today I went to dump out their water trays and I noticed tiny shoots about to break out of the top of the soil in the green bean pots. So I looked into the basil pot and, so small I would have missed it otherwise, was a tiny little stalk with two leaves. My mint looks the same, so I haven't killed that yet. This season is off to a decent start. 

And just a fun aside: I've been hungrily browsing gardening boards on Pinterest lately, and I found a fun craft the other day. My sister had given me these cute wooden garden markers that look like little houses, but now I have more plants than markers. So I made more using pain pens on landscape rocks. Then I painted more rocks to look like lady bugs just for decoration. I haven't put them out yet, but they turned out well. 

I left one blank in case I buy a plant unexpectedly.