Planning and Plotting

While the frigid north wind blows we are busy choosing varieties and plotting our gardens.
I chose to buy our seeds this year from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds. I read this winter that the newer varieties of fruits and vegetables have a fraction of the nutritional value that the heirloom varieties do. I also like the idea of keeping seeds which can be done with open pollinated plants (as heirloom plants are) not hybrids. That makes the nearly free part of gardening more nearly free in the future.

Baker Creek is a whole lot of fun to look through because of all the unusual varieties.

I went through the catalog first and wrote each of my choices on a 3x5 card divided into 8 sections, one section for each vegetable. We had several cards. I then cut the sections apart. Each child took a sheet of construction paper for his garden plot, chose vegetables (the slips of cut 3x5 cards) and glued the choices onto his garden plot paper. Then they decorated the paper with stepping stones, garden fences, pictures of the vegetable and more.

My thought is for each child's plot to be a certain distance from the others so that we don't cross pollinate. I need to to do some more research on that and seed saving.

It was very encouraging to visualize lots of gardening during this rather intense winter of loads of blowing snow.