Spring Fever

We are dealing with squishy muddy soil right now in NorthEast Ohio.  However, I can finally SEE soil!  When I go back through the gated area where Squiggy once frolicked around with Lana, I take a peek into the garden area.  I can finally see the mounds of dirt (and the plants I hadn’t pulled from last season! Shame on me!)  I am definitely getting ready to start planting in the garden!  The garden looks awful because there is no green and lots of mud, but I am thinking that I am going to start flipping the dirt, adding more soil to make the mounds a little higher, add some of the coffee grounds, eggshells and ashes I’ve been saving up, and get everything ready to start planting!  The first row I am going to start working on is the row for strawberries.

I am going to try my hand at strawberries again this year, and I know that I should be planting them right about now.  I still have to order them at this point.  I told Todd about my plans for strawberries, but he thinks I’m not good at cultivating them. When we had them in our Akron garden, we only had them for a year before we moved away (and we only got a half dozen strawberries the first year.)  Then, I planted them in the pots and didn’t water them.  It wasn’t the strawberries fault!  It was mine!  So…I am going to try it again.  We love strawberries, so I am going to do better this year with them, I promise.  Another thing I’ve always done wrong is not pinching the flowers off of them the first year.  I get too excited that strawberries will form from the flowers and eat the berries, but I hear that if you pinch the flowers off the first year, your crop DOUBLES the next.  So that is what I am going to try to do this year. 

I found a place on ebay that sells strawberries, but their season is over in the next couple of weeks. I am going to place my order and hopefully I will have my row ready for them by the time they arrive.  If I work on the garden just a half hour in the evenings after work for the rest of the week, it should be ready.  The only problem is that it is dark by the time I get home, and we have just one light outside.  Luckily, it’s close to the garden.  Hopefully I will be able to see what I’m doing!  I am planning on getting 50 strawberry plants for $0.35/each.  This includes shipping.

We have a pick-your-own place down the street from where we live.  I would like to get down there and pick some berries when they are ready and can some strawberry jam for Christmas.  That is the plan, at least.  We will see if it actually happens.