I am in one of those areas that got lots of snow this past week. We have 1-2 feet in our front yard and rather than being depressed about it… I am loving it. Winter in general this year has been very easy on me. I just stay home and relax. As I look at the calender I am a-okay with a many more weeks of cold even though Spring is my favorite season. Why? Because winter is for dreaming and planning. All good gardens and beautiful yards begin in the winter time… with seeds that begin sprouting in our imagination.
Now is the time to search your local Craigslist and thrift stores as I have been… to look for garden tools, planters, trellises, seeds, seedlings, harvest baskets, and other garden goodies. Now is the time to think about what you will plant and where. I must have kept my hubby up for half and hour past his bed time last night mumbling about snow peas and sugar snap peas. We have decided to gut our front yard and take advantage of the empty flower beds. We are going to remove some ugly bushes and plant herbs instead. We are also going to remove some of the lawn to grow food. In the backyard we are going to build some raised beds and I found two ready-built ones on Craigslist recently for $20!!
I have been compiling my wish list with things like pea fences and bean towers. I have also been deciding what we need to plant. We are going to have a salsa garden and a salad bar garden this year for sure. In general we will concentrate on growing as much food as possible to see just how self sustainable we can be and it will be a tall order because we used to have 2 acres and now he have a teeny city lot. But I love challenges! To help us get a lot out of a little space we will be doing square foot gardening. I also want to plant lots of wildflowers and sunflowers in the unused space around our garage. We eat outside almost every night in the summer months so I want fresh cut flowers on the table. Another goal is to make my own Citronella candles and bug-off bars to deter bugs. The bug-off bars recipes is from one of my FAVE books for winter dreaming… MaryJane’s Outpost. Also check out MaryJane’s Ideabook, Cookbook, Lifebook: For the Farmgirl in All of Us. MaryJane Butters is someone I really admire!!
We also plan to help my parents with their garden and share the bounty. The kids and I will likely be spending every weekend with them come Spring, since hubby might be switching to a three day (weekends only) work week. We will have two gardens to work and enjoy.
AND we are planning to make up for the trip we missed in the Fall and hopefully will get to DC to see the Cherry blossoms this year. Smithsonian here we come!
So what are YOU dreaming up this winter?
