They grow up so fast

My plants are growing fast!
First of all, the barley grass continues to shoot up, but my dog hasn't figured out yet that he's allowed to eat it. I may try putting it by his food.

Tasty?

The green beans are looking beautiful and strong and new.

I know I will have to cull some of these,
but I'm waiting to see which is strongest.

Even my basil, which I'd heard has a low rate of seed sprouting, is coming up.

This is another pot that I'll have to pull
some plants from eventually.

I also put my label marker rock in the mint plant. I haven't set out any ladybugs because I'm waiting until all my pots are planted to see where they look best.

Mint plant is still looking about the same.

I also ordered a decorative watering can a few days ago and it shipped today. I'm looking forward to it!

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.

Let's give this another go

So I got very busy with graduate school and work and let my last plants die and didn't have the energy to plant anything more. But this semester I was determined to do some more gardening experiments. My partner and dog and I went to the botanical gardens on Valentine's Day, which further inspired me.
Since I live in Florida and the weather here is warming up nicely, today I took a trip to the garden center and bought some seeds and soil. I also bought a chocolate mint plant on a whim. I love how reasonably priced gardening can be!
When I got home, I cleaned out my old pots and left them in the sun to disinfect. I also re-potted an aloe plant that I'd let get even more dry than is good for aloe. I potted the chocolate mint and only ate two leaves.
 

Sorry for the poor image quality,
but this is the mint and the aloe.

Soon I'll start seeds for my other plants.I bought seeds for basil, green beans, a container variety of carrots, lettuce and sunflowers (for the microgreens). Later in the season I'll go back to the store and buy a tomato plant and maybe either blueberries or strawberries. I'd like to branch out into fruit.
It feels really good to get back into gardening. Just cleaning out the pots and feeling the sun on my skin made me feel cheerful and productive. After I'd done that, I felt ready to tackle my homework.

Lavender is a go

My lavender seeds are finally starting to sprout. I have three of them starting to come through. They are too small to look exciting in a photograph, so no picture. But I'm feeling pretty cocky about my seed sprouting skills now.

Eating my arugula already

My arugula continues to do well, but my lavender plants have not sprouted yet. I'm hoping that they will soon. One of the seed sprouting pods has a little sprout in it, but it looks like the arugula did, so I'm not sure if it's just a stray arugula seed.
Yesterday I made bento lunches for Mike and myself. The sides were apples, chocolate, pita and hummus. The main course was coconut curry tempeh and on the top I sprinkled some of my micro greens. It's so exciting to want something green in your food and just walk over to the balcony and pick some.

Delicious

Just one day's growth

Look at how quickly the arugula grew just overnight. This really is easy!

So close to being yummy.

I only hope my lavender seeds sprout soon so I know if I'm doing something right with them. Yesterday my dog sort of trampled them because they were right where he stands to bark at other dogs walking by. I set them right again, but I'm not sure if they are going to sprout.

I sprouted something!

So after the great cauliflower disaster of '13, I looked to the future and decided to learn how to sprout seeds. But first some other good news! Yesterday I harvested some of my kale and my friend and I made delicious kale chips. They were perfectly normal kale leaves. It was pretty exciting eating something I grew for the first time.
Hopefully I will get to repeat that coup soon with arugula. I put some arugula seeds in a clay pot on my sunny balcony a few days ago. I kept it moist and today as i was watering it I noticed that some of them had sprouted! In a little while longer I'll be able to harvest them as microgreens.

They are hard to see, but they exist!

When I was at the store buying arugula seeds I noticed some lavender. I made some little origami pots and planted the seeds in them. Now I'm keeping them watered in a sunny window and hoping for the best. I love lavender so having some of my own plants would be amazing.