Plants Sneak Out for Some Sun

Can you imagine a happier day for an indoor houseplant than when they can sneak out for some sunshine on a warm, spring afternoon?

Is Spring Here?

Sure hope spring is coming to stay.

Steve in Costa Rica has this picture of "Reina de la Noche" a beautiful lilac type plant he has at his front gate. It can be poisonous in tea so if Steve ever invites you for tea... you are warned!!

Saturday…Gotta do some Yard Work!

Yep. Pretty nice day so I better get out and prune the trees...

Annie Spoils Plants!

Annie loves to spoil plants. We found this "corn plant" wasting away at a garage sale a couple of years ago. Annie treats this plant like it is in a retirement home. During the winter months, on nice days, she wheels it out to the backyard. Here you can see it enjoying a bit of sunshine and the crisp northwest air.

Annie and Rose Pick Veggies at Folk’s Place

Annie and her friend Rose headed over to the folk’s place and got a bunch of goodies. She also delivered an antenna to Dad that he wanted for a hookup on the basement of their house.

Large Green Bug in Rose

Green Bug in Rose on 12seconds.tv

12 Seconds- Dad Showing Weird, Huge Cucumber

Dad Showing Huge Cucumber, Oregon USA on 12seconds.tv

Making Paper Pots for this Year's Plants

Time to start the squash and bitter melon seeds! An easy and inexpensive way to start seeds is to use paper pots. But unlike the linked instructions I find using a right-sized soup can instead of a jar works just fine. And instead of just bunching the left over paper into the end, just make four cuts and fold each section in, taping the final section down.

You can also see we have little starter pots. These we got from Fred Meyers, called "Jiffy Discs" (I think). These are for the special seeds we got from "Pepper Bob" (Mom and Dad's neighbor). Pepper Bob is most protective of his special tomatoes but because Annie is so cute, this last summer PB gave Annie "one" tomato. Well, we already knew these tomatoes were special so instead of savoring that one tomato I found how to extract seeds (a fun project, really) and dried them. Fingers crossed, we hope that unless the tomatoes are hybrids, we will have our own special tomatoes from now on. (Don't tell Pepper Bob!)

Tomato Seed Starting
Tomato Seed Extracting Pictorial