Gardening for dummies

by Lara My seedlings were outgrowing the tray that they were planted in but it was still too early to move them outside. (I had to ask twitter if I could put them outside or not, because I really do have no ideas what I'm doing :))

I heard that you could make little pots out of newspapers that you can then plant in the ground when they're ready. GENIUS!

Only problem was that neither my husband or I could figure out how to do it with just the instructions.

So youtube to the rescue. You really can find everything on the internet now.

Once we have figured out how to make the pots, Kiernan helped me with the folding, for the first one. (Expect you'll have to make the rest on your own :))

Then we filled them with dirt and planted the seedlings. Caution, don't put very much dirt in, the newspaper pots... not THAT sturdy.

But they're doing the trick. I water them a bit at a time in my window and hope that in a week or two I can move them outside into the garden.

How's your garden doing?

Lara Wellman is mom to 4 year old Kiernan and 2 year old twins Quinn and Juliette. You can read her personal blog at Gliding Through Motherhood, about her weight loss journey at Losing it in Ottawa, and her social media blog at Larawellman.com

Gardening for dummies : planting seedlings

by Lara I most certainly do not have a green thumb.  I've killed many plants in my day and I'm not really into all things home repair and lawn maintenance.  But last year I decided I would actually plant a garden (after talking about it for 5 years) and I took enormous pleasure in tending my sad little garden and eating the tomatoes, cucumbers and peppers it produced.

This year I decided to take it a step further and plant some things from seeds in the house.  I was nervous - I have no idea what I'm doing and I'm not great at reading instructions (it's good to know these things about yourself :)) so I went to Walmart and bought a kit.  Add water. Add seeds. Cover and ignore.  PERFECT!

This tray required us to pour about 7 cups of water into those pellets to puff them up.  Then you tore them open, put a couple of seeds in and covered the tray with a lid to put in a not sunny spot.

We planted cucumbers, two kinds of tomatoes and watermelon.  We went to the store and bought the seeds together and Kiernan specifically requested the watermelon, making them his pet project and all the more interested in taking part in whole process.

He then made drawings with his dad of all the kinds of plants (using the seed packages to help) to put into the tray so we would remember what row was what.

I then put the lid on and dumped it on the dining room table because the twins were getting crazy and the time for paying attention to this ended abruptly. Which is just further proof that anyone can do this.

A few days later I went in and saw all of them had sprouted! I took the lid off and moved it to the greenhouse window we're lucky to have in our kitchen.

In the coming weeks I will be attempting to transplant them into individual pots and then out into the garden.  I'll be documenting the journey here, so stay tuned!

Lara Wellman is mom to 4 year old Kiernan and 2 year old twins Quinn and Juliette. You can read her personal blog at Gliding Through Motherhood, about her weight loss journey at Losing it in Ottawa, and her social media blog at Larawellman.com