Been a very busy few days here at the farm! Chris and I were both sick with horrible colds all this week, but we managed to get alot of work done in the field and in seed prep. Chris is already tilling up the front acre and preparing the soil to be worked. Met with the power company to see about getting power out there for the well so we can get the irrigation installed. Plants need to get into the ground by the end of April, so we are going to be on short deadline to get everything ready in time!!

While watching him - I just keep hearing that song playing in my head "She thinks my tractors SEXXY!"

Liked this pic-I can vision what thousands of flowers in bloom with the bed and breakfast in the background will look like in a few months!

In addition to the front field, the kitchen garden is prepared and tilled too and all the hard work of getting tons of horse manure, chicken poop and leaf mold by the trailer load full seems to have paid off. The soil looks and feels totally different. The pic below shows where the row of zinnias will go to surround the garden, and on the inside of the fence is where there will be cucumbers growing up the fence.

We are on schedule for the seed starting so far and I have been experimenting with how to get more seeds on each shelf to maximize our tiny bathroom space.

Started the tomato seeds as well.
Got 5 different varieties going!

Experimenting with some trays, I found these for $1.00 at wal-mart. I can get 180 plants per tray, thats 720 plants per shelf. With 5 shelves thats a total of 3600 seedlings at a time!! Whoo hooo

Sunny enjoying the weather out on the porch

View of the kitchen garden freshly tilled.

All the bulbs are finally starting to spring up around the property. Got this shot during a sunset walk.

Lemon Basils are on their way showing first true leaves.

Rudbeckias are taking off too. These are so easy to grow, am sure I will be growing a ton of these. I am looking forward to gathering buckets full of their yellow daisy-like flowers.

Another view of the basils under grow lights

Sweet Peas busting out of their seeds. The seed coat is so tough. We managed to take the germination time from 21 days to 1 week by reading a tip about nicking their seed coat with fingernail clippers. This allows the moisture to contact the inside of the seed much sooner and shave a few weeks off their sprouting time. It worked like a charm!

All of the sweet peas are out in the greenhouse now. They are one of the only flowers I am growing that actually prefer the cooler temps, so they are out there in the hoophouse without any heat. I just tossed a sheet of plastic on top of them to prevent any birds, mice or racoons from trying to grab a snack. Only planted 120 sweet peas since we were behind schedule for them and should have gotten them in for the fall or at least a month or two earlier then we were able. Sweet peas are not fans of warm weather, so I hope we can get a few stems from them before the hot days arrive.