A World of Many Hats and Not Enough Shoes

Today, we planted & learned a WHOLE lot!

Truth be told, this photo was taken at the end of our work day. I wanted to point out two things besides the obvious, that they are all wearing their cowboy hats, and I photo-shopped one of Miriam's eyes...

1. The fact that they are all soaking wet from the waist down.

The garden has an old pump spicket that we can use. It has a lever you pull up to get the water out. The water comes out gushing like a fire hydrant. The boys were on water patrol and subsequently got very distracted by its force. Miriam then would sit wherever the boys had just poured their water. (And, yes, Miriam is wearing her skirt over her pants. And, yes, I was not thinking when Miriam left the house that she was wearing a white shirt.)

2. There are seeds in 2 of our beds!

We did actually get seeds in the ground today, but the process was definitely a learning one. Like remembering to water everywhere not just the raised beds. I forgot that one last night so this AM we will go and water abundantly.

Here are some other little things I learned from today in gardening with kids...

1. Seed tape! We did not use seed tape but when we plant our after frost date veggies I am SO buying it! Seed tape is this sticky stuff that you can lay out seeds on and is really helpful (I've read) for those pesky tiny seeds. Today our goal was to plant some lettuce seeds. I did not remember that those seeds are teeny of tiny. While Ezekiel did a great job making his furrow, the 1" spacing is probably more like 1/8" and who knows if they can even survive in that state? I know even at 1" you are supposed to thin to 6" but we'll see how this works.

2. Soil prep only when needed. Getting the soil ready on Monday and planting on Thursday was tougher than I thought. By today the soil was hard again, and clumpy and I couldn't help but think of the verse about seeds falling on rocky soil. Though these rocks were only made of mud, they seemed like they would not promote growth at all. We had to work really hard to get our soil back to good soil to take root in. (I am sure there is a beautiful analogy in here.) Tomorrow we are going to try and plant some broccoli and I think I will be bringing some extra top soil to help liven up the soil. Again, we'll see how that works.

3. Hide the watering cans until needed. That was by far the toughest part sue to the fact that those watering can and water make for so much fun, who needs seeds or work? Ezekiel was still on task but Jeremiah and Miriam were living it up for sure. (I think Jeremiah and Miriam would do much better if they each had their own personal gardener at their side keeping them on task.)

4. Who knows what's growing where? Unfortunately with the tiny seeds around, and awkward kid fingers, we could have lettuce growing in our entire garden. Even our peas, which are a huge seed, were scattered by Miriam in lovely little patterns not straight lines. Who knows what, where, or when we will see anything. I think we will layout with more string next time in order to remind to plant ONLY along this line, etc.

We were recommended to plant in stages to staggered harvests, separating by a week. We are going to attemp