Peppers, cauliflower, peppers, cabbage, peppers, leeks, and peppers.

Dreary day today, and the snow is falling down, perfect for planting.  I wish.  I would prefer a little sunshine, but you take what you get.  Being that we are at about 11 ish weeks until around our last frost, I had some seeds that needed to get started.  I am going slightly ahead of schedule, just a week or two, but mother nature was ahead of schedule last year, and I would bet she is again this year.  So I am planning accordingly.

Peppers
Last year we planted some mini peppers, and they were a little too mini, as in the size of a large marble.  And Mike was the only pepper eater in the family.  This year, Jonathan has a new found love for red, orange, and yellow peppers,  as in he eats them almost every day in his lunch.  And I am tolerating them much more than I use to, and even enjoying the every now and then.  So we are planting peppers.  To eat, and to freeze.  They freeze great if you dice them up, and they are great to add on to homemade pizza, in omeletts, hash browns, homemade sloppy joes, and much more.  We will eat what we can, and the rest we will dice and freeze.  W are planting King Of The North, which is a hardy sweet red pepper good for short growing seasons, California Wonder, a sweet yellow pepper, and 2 Jalapeno plants which I saved seeds from a farmers market pepper, and trying again the Burpee organic Carnival Pepper mix.  I was hesitant with the Burpee seeds, even though they were organic, worried that they were owned by Monsanto. They are in fact not owned by Monsanto, however they do get some seeds from a Monsanto subsidiary..  They also pledged not to sell any GMO seeds.  They are not my first choice in seed companies but I did want to try out these peppers. In all, I planted 2 Jalapeno plants, 2 Carnival Pepper, 4 King Of The North, and 4 California Wonder.

Cauliflower
I planted the Giant Of Naples from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.  4 of these giants.  Let's hope they live up to their name.  After our broccoli fail last year we are trying cauliflower instead.  This we will eat raw, or cook up, or freeze. Everyone but Lilah likes cauliflower, but she will at least take a few bites.

Cabbage
Late Flat Dutch, and this bad boys look huge.  In the seed packed picture a little boy is holding up a giant head of cabbage.  I hope mine look as nice when they are done growing.  I am also planting 4 heads of cabbage. I plan on using most of it to can sauerkraut   And eat some fresh sauteed or as coleslaw.  We bought a few small cabbage plants last year, they did decent despite the fact that they went out late and it was super hot and dry last summer.  Hoping starting these early will give them enough time to mature.

Leeks
I love leeks.  In scrambled eggs, quiches, soups, you name it.  I bought quite a few from the farmers market last year, they last a while in the fridge, and I even diced and froze quite a few.  These seem to be needy.  I will be taking half the dirt out of the squares in the garden before they are transplanted outside.  Then when planted, you have to pile the dirt up around them as they grow to get more of the white are in the leeks, and that is the best part.  This is our first time planting leeks.  Hopefully we'll have enough time to tend to them.  I am planting 12 of them to start.  Technically you can put 9 in a square foot, but I think I am going to do 2 squares with 6 in each.

All of these seeds are in one of my larger seed trays, covered with a clear lid.  They are watered good and the lid will stay on until the seeds germinate. Until they germinate, they like it warm, so they will be hanging out on top of the dryer for a week or so.  After that they will move to the counter in the kitchen under a grow light.

Let's hope I can keep these all alive for the next 10-12 weeks.  Fingers crossed.  And toes.