Growing Greens - Preparing for Summer

Putting food on the table usually costs either time or money.

How to provide free food for your family next summer:

*Collect newspapers, free local papers if you can.

*Roll and fold those papers into little pots. I was given a gadget for doing this, but you can just as easily roll the paper around a straight sided glass tumbler.

*Mix up some seedling soil using river sand that you have collected, your own home made compost and vermiculite from the attic. A 1:1:1 ratio will do.

Fill the paper pots with your soil.

Search through your seed collection, some saved from last summer, some harvested and stored and some kindly given by loved ones.

Select seeds according to your garden plan, drawn up in the free 30 day trial from Jane's Delicious Garden Planner. So far over a hundred pots planted, many more to go.

Carefully place seeds into pots at the right depths, place in a warm spot indoors, spray with water twice daily and keep them covered until they germinate.

Uncover and place your baby seedlings under a light until they are strong enough to harden off gradually outside.

As the weather warms, plant up the modular seed trays that were kindly left behind by friends who left the country. They should germinate faster outdoors. The pic below is from last summer. Labelling the rows of seeds is vital. Trust me, I know. I still have a few unknowns growing merrily in the tunnel.

Plant them out into prepared beds in the garden.

Love them and care for them long enough and they will reward you with food for harvesting, enough to share and more.

Cost: R0, nothing, zip, not a cent.

Time and effort: plenty of time, effort, energy and patience

Rewards: Food for your family and some wonderful, free garden therapy. 

Gratitude: Immeasurable 

Sense of wonder: Priceless