The Best Cure

It seems that cold and flu season had one last virus up it's sleeve and I've been the lucky recipient of it since last week. On top of that I've been dealing with some family emergencies recently as well. My brother in St Catharine's had a near disaster with a table saw a week ago Friday- he caught his wrist with the blade and did serious damage to his soft tissues (thankfully not the bone). The surgeon was able to repair it and he should have near full function once it heals but he's looking at two months in a cast! Then my mom who has heart disease, had some issues and was hospitalized overnight -again thankfully it turned out to be not as serious as first thought and she's home again but worrisome just the same. It was a downright miserable week and I feel like I'm still recovering.

Not surprisingly I haven't had the inclination to post much and all of the challenges fell by the wayside. Of course life still goes on and stuff still got done so I thought I'd do a brief check in to prove I'm still alive and kicking.

One thing that's always guaranteed to shake me out of a slump is getting my hands dirty so I've been spending as much time as possible in the garden or preparing for it. The garden beds have been raked, the composters emptied, the rain barrle's hooked up again and a winter's worth of debris is gone.


The farm cats are ecstatic to be outdoors again. They follow me around the yard, happily rolling in the dirt and climbing everything that can hold them.

I even managed to coax some help from the Russian, trimming some branches and chopping them up for other projects. He works best on creating stuff and prefers to leave the actual gardening to me. I have some new ideas for trellising that I'll suggest to him to come up with the working model- he's usually pretty ingenious!

I'm excited to see the garlic I planted in the fall is already up- it's the first time I actually remembered to plant some!

The strawberries look healthy as do the raspberry canes and the rhubarb is up too.

Up on the deck, the herbs are making a comeback- the mild winter allowed them to winter over even in the shallow pot so we are already eating fresh oregano, thyme and sage. Things are moving towards a bountiful growing season!


I still haven't managed to get any seeds for cool weather crops in the ground yet but I have rapini, peas and lettuce seeds set out to plant this weekend. It may still be a bit too early now that the temperatures are seasonably cool but I'm going to chance it anyhow since the soil is warm and the beds are ready. If they take a little longer to germinate so be it, at least they're in the ground.


Inside things are moving along as well. About 50 % of the tomatoes I pre-germinated survived being transplanted in soil- more might have survived had I been paying better attention and planted them earlier/ kept up with watering immediately afterwards. I still have a respectable amount of seedlings, just over 20, but I have only a small number of a few varieties, and a couple varieties of which none survived. There's still plenty of time to reseeded thankfully. I've got a couple of things started in the greenhouse at work as well and I'm looking at what needs to be seeded next- it's still a bit early for most things but I'm anxious to get going.

It's Easter this weekend and I hope you all enjoy the time off with family and loved ones, and puttering around in your own gardens!