Catnip - We have five cats in the house, and two barn kitties. It seems natural that we'd do well to have a catnip patch. I'm not sure how we'll keep the barn kitties out of it while it grows, but it's supposed to grow well spreading on its own. I put it in the old laundry soap container. I had some reservations using this jug. Even after sanitizing it twice, it still smells like laundry soap. That said, it's a biodegradable, all natural laundry soap without harsh chemicals, and we won't be eating the catnip, so I figured I'd use the scent to my benefit. I'm hoping it masks the smell of the catnip long enough for it to get a good start, so Luna and Gypsy don't destroy it right away. The seeds were organic. I used the last of the packet, about 100 seeds.
Bell Pepper Mix - These were seeds we've saved from various store-bought bell peppers we've added to our dinners. There are red, orange, and yellow pepper seeds in the mix. As they dry they tend to get mixed up. I made 40 little pencil-tip holes in the soil, and put two seeds in each. I did three rows of known colors (yellow at the end, then orange, then red), and the remaining holes were given two random seeds. I've found that pepper plants do as well or better if planted two to a hole. And how cool to have what looks like one bushy plant that produces two different colored peppers? There are 80 seeds in this jug.
Lemon Balm - We've never had this before, so I'm not entirely sure how to use it, but I figure, why not? These seeds came to me in a mystery lot I bought off Listia, and rather than add them to the collection, I just decided to plant them. They're perennial so plant them once and we can figure out what to do with them later. If you have any tried and true recipes or ideas for what to do with lemon balm, please let me know! I used the whole packet, about 45 seeds.
Garlic Chives - I love garlic chives, and would have been happy to plant a lot more seeds if I had them. As it is, I used all 25 seeds in the packet. Another perennial, these ones are delicious in scrambled eggs.
Sage - A garden classic. I have some blushing sage growing in a hanging basket in the kitchen window, but these will be plain sage. I used the last of a baggy I got my first year trading (they're small and old), and about ten more seeds from a more recent packet (about 4x the size). All together there's about 25 seeds in this jug, but I'm not sure if the old seeds will come up.
Blue Bird Forget-Me-Not - We've tried these before. We planted several Forget-Me-Not varieties and only one came up, but it grew so slowly it never actually made it out of the container. I'm not sure which variety grew and which ones failed. This is likely the only version we will be planting this year, so hopefully something comes up. There are about 75 seeds in this jug.
Fennel - Old seeds from a trade several years ago, but wow they smell good! No variety name, but I'm sure they'll still taste good. I used the last of the packet, so about 40 seeds.
Black Swan Poppy - I don't remember planting these before, but the seed packet was open, so maybe I did and they didn't come up? I'm not sure. They look pretty on the packet. These would be planted out on the septic mound to beautify an otherwise unusable area. There's about 100 seeds in this jug.
Pampasgrass - This one's probably a waste of space in all honesty. This was a packet of seeds I bought on eBay from an overseas seller last year. It's supposed to be "purple pampasgrass" but it looks more like chaff. I see no seeds and there's nothing in there that is hard or firm or resembles any kind of seed at all. The contents of this packet would easily be winnowed out with the slightest breeze. I put in half the packet (packet was supposed to have 500 seeds, so I'm labeling this one as 250 seeds). I'm not holding my breath for anything coming up in this jug.
This brings our winter sowing jug total to 51 so far! This also concludes our herbs for 2018. Now I just need to figure out what squash, melons, peppers, tomatoes, eggplants, and any other odds and ends we still need to get winter sown, and save up enough containers for those too.
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Tomorrow my daughter is having her girlfriend over for dinner. I'm planning to make the delicious brown sugar and garlic crock pot rabbit recipe (check it out here). Hopefully this makes a good first impression. I'm a little nervous, especially since this dinner will be served in the same kitchen where our lovely pet rabbit Wisp can watch us eat. This seems normal to us, but for someone new to our home, this might be seen as a little unnerving.
We are supposed to be getting some snow tomorrow night into Tuesday, followed by two more nights of negative temperatures. After that the forecast (so far) shows us hovering just below freezing for the high temps and staying in the positive digits for low temps at night for the foreseeable future.
Tony went and bought our new couch today. I have mixed feelings about this. It's a nice couch, and really this is the first time I can remember going to a store (not second hand) and picking out our own furniture. However, it takes what was a nice open living room and makes it feel a lot more cluttered and confined. I'm really glad I was able to talk him out of getting the recliner too. It's a tiny house, and we just don't have the space!
The couch came wrapped in this fabric that I instantly recognized. It looks just like the fabric they make the bags from that you are supposed to put soil in and grow your veggies. I pulled off the tape and folded it up nice. When I get around to it (probably not this grow season), I will cut and sew the fabric into bags to use as container gardening around the property where space allows.