March 26, 2025:
This weekend I sorted and organized the entire seed collection. Not 100% but good enough!! Made tags for everything I’m starting today and over the next few days. Started soaking a variety of seeds: loofah, morning glory, spinach and chard. Put up a small grow light in the plant room. Need to wet the soil and make soil blocks. Filled 8pk peat pots with soil and seeds.
(*1 Hour Later*)
– Tray 1 (8pk peat pots): purple and white kohlrabi, cabbage (Golden Acre & Michihili), celery (Tall Utah) and kale (lacinato, purple, scarlet, Blue Curled Scotch, Starbor, green), broccoli x 2, broccoli raab, Brussels sprouts, red lettuce, Salanova lettuce mix, Black Seeded Simpson lettuce, Cabernet onion and marigold.
(*Got Tired, Threw in the Towel for the Night*)

March 27, 2025:
– Tray 2 (soil blocks): morning glory (red, a new-to-me variety, so excited!!), chard, spinach (grown and harvested in childhood backyard – heart hands -), parsley (Giant Italian), basil (Mammoth and Holy Basil/Tulsi, also my own saved seed), German chamomile, Romaine lettuce and alyssum (also excited to try for the first time).

I also seeded 4 x 4″ pots with loofah (scattered) after they soaked 24 hours (new and old seed).

Lastly, I took a damp paper towel and folded it in half, placing the remaining soaked loofah seed near the crease. Then I placed the paper towel in a plastic sandwich bag, sealed it and placed it above my vanity in the bathroom where it gets a lot of warmth and no disturbance. This is my cheat code to germinating loofah. We’ll see sprouting in just a few days.

March 28, 2025:
Seeded seven more 4″ pots with two seeds per pot. These included four soaked seeds from the plastic bag, soaked two days ago! Incredible. I also seeded two varieties sent by fellow growers I connected with in a loofah growing Facebook group.

Seeded a few ground cherries with lettuce and chamomile, and seeded bottle gourds with the same.

Everything I worked on today makes up most of Tray 3, and will kept on the heat mat for best germination. We’ll see if the lettuce minds. I just love a good companion plant. Fingers crossed!

Other notes:
– Over the next few days, weeks and months I will soak the following 12 hours before direct sowing outside: peas, beets, beans, morning glory, nasturtium, loofah, corn and squash.
– So far, I have only spent about $13 on two bags of organic potting soil.
– I really love how coated Salanova seeds look like a basket of eggs.
– Planting seeds into a piece of loofah from which it grew; beautiful full circle moment.
– This is my 10th garden season, and it’s almost second nature by now, but I’m still giddy.

March 29, 2025:
Wow, it really is go-time! Many summer crops need a long growing period, so indoor starts are necessary.

Oops! I may have bought more seeds… I walked by, I didn’t mean to look… well, you know how it goes. I got: chives, Bright Lights cosmos, Empress of India and Gleam nasturtium, moss rose, spearmint and borage. I am so excited! For this garden… spring, summer, fall. I am excited for all the different combinations of plants we can create. Sunflowers, tall and sturdy, with cosmos and borage in the middle, a climbing something or other up the sunnies, then moss rose and weekly-trimmed basil mid-to-low. Another combination I want to try is loofah, nasturtium, marigold, lettuce, radish, greens, onions and chives.

Soaked a few of each nasturtium (scarified first), red morning glory and loofah.

Seeded two pots: cosmos, spearmint and moss rose & borage, white marigold and chives.

Side note: I scattered moss rose seed in with my aloe plant; daydreaming of that bloomin’.

Moved Tray 2 up to the light, turned them both vertical, and turned on the full spectrum photo light, as well as a third, portable, grow light. Seedlings need a LOT of light! Now, it’s keeping them well-watered, regularly fertilized (once they’re big enough), and sung to regularly. I will need to harden them off, as well, so that they do not experience too much transplant shock. If hardened off properly, they shouldn’t miss a beat. If it does happen, that’s okay, they usually bounce back within a week.

I do plan to buy a plastic greenhouse. That will be super helpful in about four weeks.

Seeded ground cherries, Romaine lettuce, chamomile and birdhouse gourd, along with white marigold and thyme. Also seeded rosemary, bergamot and moss rose. Tray 3 is full now.

March 30, 2025:
Tray 1 new germination: white & purple kohlrabi, Black Seeded Simpson lettuce and broccoli raab.

Tray 2 new germination: chamomile, chard, morning glory.

Sowed the soaked seeds from last night: loofah, morning glory and nasturtium.

Other Notes:
– Spent about $13 more on soil and $16 on seeds.

March 31, 2025:
Woke to more seedlings emerging: chard, loofah, purple kale, blue curled kale, one baby Salanova lettuce, and also, I believe I have two of three in the amaranth, clover, bergamot pot beginning to take root! Also, more white marigold. It’s this variety of marigold. So beautiful! I find marigold seeds very interesting, and it blows my mind that they turn into new plants. I also see sprouting in the ground cherry and Romaine and ground cherry and chamomile pots. It might all be Romaine. They’ll reveal themselves soon enough! I’m very glad I tagged every pot.

As soon as I see loofah pop, I get it under the grow light. Another loofah cheat code!

April 1, 2025:
Nothing too crazy today, just worked and then took the first look at everything. Wow! Lots of growth. The Romaine is putting out its first true leaves. Three or four more loofah popped. I see two or more Salanova popping, as well as another purple kale and more Romaine in another tray. It’s almost time for a shift in trays, maybe later tonight. Seven full days. So much growing and changing in a week.

Oh! I am seeding the soaked loofah that went in the plastic bag with damp paper towel. 1 seed per cell x 10 cells. I want to remember that 1 full 10″ x 20″ tray can fit 50 cells (5-10 cell peat pots).

Using what I have to make plant marker tags. I love a good repurpose/recycle!!

April 2, 2025:
Watering and keeping everything under the light, monitoring what’s still not yet germinated (checked beneath the soil a few times and was pleasantly surprised to see germination happening). All six varieties of kale are now germinated, Lacinato being the last. Pretty neat, as those seeds were from 2020! A few more Starbor kale, Bay Meadow broccoli, and what I thought at the time of writing this to be nasturtium, but turned out to be morning glory, are all popping up. Holding off on planting anything for about a week. This way I can up-pot anything needed and reorganize for space and light accessibility.

I moved a few extra green kale seedlings to open cells that didn’t germinate (red lettuce), and I plan to do the same for any other cells that remain empty over the next 5-7 days. That timeframe should be enough to know if most things are up – I know celery can take some time, along with spinach and herbs.

Not bad for this year’s toss/Hail Mary scatter list (no germ or little germ): red lettuce, Brussels sprouts, Golden Acre cabbage and cabernet onion.

April 3, 2025:
I SEE A SOLE SPINACH popping! Yay!

Also seeing a Holy Basil/Tulsi seedling emerging!!

Just took some time.

I’m hopeful for the parsley and rest of spinach.

(*Afternoon*)

I see celery starting to germinate – awesome!

April 4, 2025:
Borage popping today (six days). Today during my lunch (30 minutes) I was able to separate a few over-seeded loofah containers so there is now just one or two seedlings per pot. I am so very pleased with the germ rate… nearly 100%. These particular loofah seeds are the same ones I’ve shared to hundreds of local (and national) gardeners! That is very exciting and hopeful.

Anyone reading this have seeds from me? Let me know how your germ rates were/are!

April 5, 2025:
Chives emerging (7 days).

April 6, 2025:
I bought an additional grow light, it’s a four-head clamp light (LED). Down with the coolness.

April 7, 2025:
I put out some feelers and discovered that there a local interest in learning how to grow microgreens. Now, I can’t say I’m an expert, but I’ve worked on three farms, two of which are USDA certified organic, that happened to be known for their microgreen production. For a short period of time, I even got experience working in a restaurant’s on-site greenhouse where we grew all own microgreens and salad greens. That being said, I got a lot of experience by watching and assisting in all steps of the process; i.e., seeding, watering, harvesting, packaging and selling.

I’d love to share more on this in the future. 📌

Bright Lights cosmos. Only a few to test the germination. I will definitely be starting more.

April 8, 2025:

April 10, 2025:

April 11, 2025:

April 12, 2025:

April 13, 2025:
Today we broke ground and worked the soil, cutting overhanging branches, removing grass and inevitably stirring up more weed seed (the trade-off for rich, silky soil to shape beds and grow a bounty for us all). I was so grateful for the extra hands. Thank you Dad and Chris! You’re the best!

April 14, 2025:
Gave everything a good thorough watering and put a fan on low setting for a while. It’s almost time for a new round of seeding; I am getting really excited knowing Friday I’ll be buying a small greenhouse. I’m starting to visualize where I’ll seed everything and how much/what I can re-seed, then move, harden off, plant, water, cover, tend to, etc. It’s all coming together, and it’ll be a very beautiful garden. Tons of seed. Lots of room. Fine as hell soil. This is my happy place. I’ve now gardened at both grandparents’ and my childhood home. I told my dad yesterday as we worked the soil, I said, I used to have dreams of us gardening together. It makes me feel close to him, and to my late Poppy (his dad), as my earliest garden memories are with him in Burlington, Illinois.

While I do have an incredible simplified garden journal that I use just about every nook and cranny (highly recommend this garden journal, by the way), I don’t necessarily have exact dates in mind for when everything happens. I get questions a lot that ask for an exact planting date for indoor sowing, hardening off, etc. I have tried using exact dates many times, but nine times out of ten the weather shifts my plans, or life requires I put the garden lower on the priority list. I do, however, notate seeding and germination dates, then transplant dates, direct sow dates and harvest dates. My main focus is last frost date, and light succession planting helps me hit that narrow window for some of the more fickle crops that require ideal night temperatures, a high enough soil temp and an extensive number of growing days.

More soaked peas went into peat pots tonight.

April 15, 2025:
Spinach popping! I am so excited to have more spinach growing.

April 16, 2025:
Planned everything I’ll be seeding directly into the soil this weekend.

April 18, 2025:
(Below): Soaked/planted peas are already popping up. Soon to be planted in the soil, peat pot and all. These seen here are peas I grew and saved seed, so I’m a proud plant mama once again!!