Garden Friday

What better use for a coffee can?

Welcome to Garden Friday!
It's officially winter here in the Piedmont,
although chilly temperatures have been a constant for the last few weeks.
It's been a challenge to get anything done out in the garden
(except for decorating with holiday lights),
but slowly, a few projects are coming along.

last year's daffs

I managed to get a few types of spring bulbs planted,
but not as many as I had hoped.
Ah well, there's always next season, right?
Adding a few more each spring and fall
will eventually have our garden stocked with blooms.



While it's not entirely impossible to have success planting this late in the season,
NC State Extension recommends doing so by mid-December.
Of course, the bulbs are better off planted than stuck in your fridge,
waiting for next autumn, so it's worth a shot if the ground hasn't yet frozen.

 Some of the lettuces that managed to survive my neglect
were transplanted into containers,

 while several were planted directly into the hugelkultur bed.
With a heavy blanket of mulched leaves,
I'm hoping they will be well insulated and cozy.

 This has been the perpetual scene at our place.
We work on raking the leaves,
but we have miles to go to corral them all.
Maybe we'll finally catch up,
now that most of the leaves have completed their exodus from branches.

To aid in this endeavor,
Big K found this leaf mulcher on a local online marketplace.
I'm stoked, I tell ya!
It makes it so easy to just wander around the property
and suck up every last leaf I can find.

It grinds them into just the right sized mulch
that I've been adding to flower beds, veggie beds and containers.
What a blessing.
No doubt we'll get plenty of use out of it every fall.
The bonus is that we were able to buy used,
our preferred method of staying green 
and saving money to boot.

Enjoy a wonderful weekend!