June 3, 2011

To market, to market….

One of my favorite things to do on Saturday mornings in the summer is grab a cup of coffee and “hit the market”. And by this I mean the Farmers Market.

I grew up a market kid. For pretty much as far back as I can remember, Saturday mornings meant heading to the Farmers Market with my mom.  As a kid I didn’t get it.  It all seemed the same: rows and rows of tomatoes, radishes, lettuce, cukes, you name it.  My mom would check each of them out and move on, keeping tabs on the vendors who had produce she was interested in.  At the time I couldn’t figure out what on earth the difference was.  WHY did we have to go down EVERY row?  They all have the same stuff, or so I thought.  I swore she just brought me along to haul the bags for her and when you’re 6 or 7, carrying bags of carrots, beets, radishes, kohlrabi, etc. can get pretty heavy!  Not to mention it can be kind of scary when you lose your mom because she stopped to check out the 10th tomato vendor (because the others “didn’t look good” even though they all looked just fine to 7-year-old eyes) and you got distracted by the brilliantly colored flowers across the aisle and turned to find people are swarming everywhere.  Despite all these hurdles I had to overcome (wink, wink) I came to love the market.  I started to learn the difference between the fresh and not-so-fresh, the ripe and the “not quite” and why my said some things “didn’t look good”.  Then there were the brats hot of the grill.  Like Foot Longs at the State Fair, no matter what time we got to the market, a brat was our reward at the end.  Many brats were eaten before 7:30am!  Mom liked to go early, and she still does.  Get there early, get the freshest produce, get a hot brat and head out before it gets too crazy.

I grew up going to the Minneapolis Farmers Market, you know, the one that has the red roofs you can see from the freeway, but can’t figure out how the heck to get there?  Yeah, that one.  That market has changed a lot over the years, yet the core has remained the same.  Nice people, nice produce, nice vendors. Nice and busy, yet laid back.

Although I don’t get there often, only because it’s “on the other side of the river”, I’ve also like the St. Paul Farmers Market too.  For lack of a better way to describe it, this one feels a little more trendy to me.  The one thing I really like about this market is that 100% of the produce is locally grown.  I’ve heard that this year they’ve also added free horse-drawn wagon rides from the parking lot to the market.  My son will love this!

When I don’t have a lot of time or just want a more low-keyed market experience, I head to the Richfield Farmers Market. This market has yet to fail me.  They always have a little bit of everything, just enough selection, large bouquets of fresh-cut flowers on the cheap and crepes! Oh, and cheese and bread and jams and such just like their bigger relatives, what’s not to like?

Regardless of where you live, what you like in a market or farm stand, whether you’ve never been to one or go all the time, support them. Especially if the produce is local!  The market is an experience. Plus, there’s nothing like a fresh radish, fresh lettuce, fresh asparagus and oh…. the fresh sugar snap peas… I can’t wait until they’re ready!

My challenge to you is this:  Get to a market (or farm stand).  Buy something new to you.  While you’re there, talk to the vendor.  REALLY talk to them.  Find out where they’re from, how long they’ve been growing produce or how long they’ve been selling at the market, some of their stories can be amazing.  This does a few things… gets you out, exposes you to something that could become a new favorite food, and brings back our connection to people, our food and where it comes from. It helps bring us full circle.

So, tomorrow is Saturday. If you’re looking for me I’ll be “at the Market” bright and early with coffee in hand, my market bag on my shoulder and hauling my son along to help carry… flowers.

I hope you go.  I hope you love it as much as I do.   And I hope you jiggety-jog as you go home again.

Kate

Posted in Favorites, Mindful Living | Leave a Comment »

May 27, 2011

Planting time!

Memorial weekend, garden calendar, garden notebook.  What do all of these things have in common?  It’s time to plant!

By now we should be in the clear as far as frosty nights are concerned, but the other key factor to seed germination and plant growth is warm soil.  Each seed needs certain conditions to grow, warm season crops and tender crops typically need the soil temp to be 60 – 85 degrees in order to germinate whereas cool season crops only need it to be around 40 degrees.  Granted we’ve had a crazy spring, (although growing up in Minnesota, I’m not really sure what a “normal” spring would look like!) but the soil temperatures over the last week or so have been hovering in the low to mid 60s in Central Minnesota, so it’s basically a green light to plant.  As the soil continues to warm, the seeds will germinate and the plants will begin to grow.

One thing to keep in mind if you’re doing container gardening is that the soil in the containers warms and cools more drastically than the soil in the ground.  What this means is that they truly benefit from a warm, sunny day now because the soil will warm faster, likewise later in the summer they will continue to warm faster, which is why some plants tend to wilt in pots.  The soil in containers will  also cool significantly faster as well.  This is part of the reason why container gardens typically need more attention than plants in the ground, but that’s another subject all together.

So, now’s the time to pop those warm season crops, such as tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, etc. in the ground.    If you haven’t started your own seeds earlier in the season, buy seedlings or more mature plants from local plant sales or garden centers.  Warm season crops have a long growing period.  If you plant these from seed now, they won’t have enough time to grow and produce fruit before frost in the fall.

Now is also a good time to plant the tender crops like cucumbers, pumpkins, melons and squash.  These, unlike warm season crops can be planted by seed now.  To help them germinate more quickly, you can cover them with hot caps (a.k.a. Hot Kaps, Hotkaps) to help warm the soil and get them to germinate faster.  Remove the cap when they are  growing vigorously.

If you haven’t already done so, you can also plant: beans (bush, pole, dry, lima), beets, broccoli, brussel sprouts, cabbage, carrots, cauliflower, celery, radishes, kohlrabi, lettuce (leaf and head), parsley, potatoes and sweet corn.

I wish you a happy holiday weekend and happy planting!

Kate

Posted in Container Gardening, Organic Gardening, Seed Starting, Veggie Garden | Leave a Comment »

May 12, 2011

… showers bring May flowers…

Today is another cold and rainy day in the Twin Cities, but for some reason it didn’t get me down.  Okay, maybe a little, while I fought the urge to hang out under a blanket and read a book instead of going to my son’s baseball game tonight.  But since they didn’t cancel the game and he was so anxious to play, I went. My jeans wicked water from the bottom to mid-calf and my socks were more like damp sponges, but I got to see my son’s first hit of the season so I couldn’t be happier.  He even got the “game ball” tonight.  No blanket or book could have been better than seeing the smile on his face.  It was a great end to a wet, grey day.

There are many things about rainy days that I love.  I love hearing the cars splash through the puddles.  I love listening to birds sing while they use the rain as their own personal shower.  I love watching rain drops slide across leaves and drip down to the ground below.  I love how the filtered sunlight changes the colors of everything outside.  I love how intense the yellow is on goldfinches and orioles.  I love that rainy days slow everything down.  It takes everything back a couple of notches.  Especially in the spring. Ever since the weather has begun to warm up I’ve felt a surge of energy.  Energy in the plants, animals, water, everywhere.  It’s like everything and everyone has been running in high gear. The rain gives me a chance to pause, reflect and catch my breath.

Rain seems to have the opposite effect on plants though.  Have you ever looked out the window while it’s raining and just observed?  Rain is like an instant energy source for plants.  Give them water and I swear you can watch them grow before your very eyes.  In the past couple of days I’ve watched my raspberries leaf out, buds start to pop on the grape vines and the pear trees go into full blossom.  The asparagus is now ripe for picking, Monarda is popping up everywhere and peonies and lilies are growing taller by the minute.  Tulips, daffodils, rhododendrons, azaleas, hyacinths and Forsythias are all in full bloom, as are the magnolias and some of the flowering crabs.  The best part is… there are so many sweet smells to go with it!

The rain has also made my lawn bloom, literally.  Since I don’t use chemicals and haven’t focused much time on weed control, there is a nice crop of dandelions and creeping charlie in my yard.  We inherited these with the house when we bought it and I honestly haven’t devoted much time to getting rid of them. However, there’s a part of me that thinks of these “weeds” as a gift.  I know, you probably think I’m crazy but the most beautiful time of the year in my backyard is right now.  Resting within the lush green grass is a sea of purple creeping charlie blossoms combined with bright yellow dandelions and splashes of white and lavender violets. If everything is timed just right, in a few days the pink petals from the flowering crab will begin to fall and add yet another color to the mix.  It truly is beautiful.

I promise to provide pictures to prove it!

What have the spring showers brought you?

Kate

Posted in Flower Gardening, Mindful Living, Organic Gardening, Ornamental Grasses, Perennials | Leave a Comment »

May 11, 2011

Grab your gloves. It’s (nearly) time to plant!

Wait for it, wait for it…  Go!

The “Average Last Frost Date” for the Twin Cities, Minnesota is May 15th.  Exactly what does that mean to gardeners?  It means planting time…. sort of.

Average last frost date means just that.  It’s an average.  Some years our last frost is earlier, some years later.  (I think last year it was in January.) Granted yesterday was more like a hot summer day in August with temps reaching 90+ degrees and thunder storms and tornadoes last night, but it is Minnesota.  (Remember last week?  We had snow.)  The weather the rest of this week and moving into this weekend is forecasted to be more like a “normal” upper mid-western spring.  Since I left my crystal ball at the bowling alley the last time I was there and meteorologists don’t forecast out that far, we’re not sure what next couple of weeks will look like weather-wise, so go ahead and plant, with caution.

If you’re putting in veggies or annuals, keep in mind that you need to be watching the night-time lows.  If it looks like temps are going to drop down into the mid- to low-30s be prepared to cover your plants and if temps get really low, possibly lose a couple.  The other thing to keep in mind is that warm season crops, such as tomatoes, will not benefit from being planted early and actually will just “sit there” until the soil is warm and the weather is right. Perennials on the other hand, can be planted without much concern.  The worst thing that can happen to most of them is a really, really cold snap can damage their buds and cause them to drop some of their flowers.

So, if you have the hankering like I do.  Go ahead and plant, but have some old bed sheets handy, “just in case”.

Now, get out there and get dirty!

Kate

Posted in Flower Gardening, Organic Gardening, Perennials, Veggie Garden | Leave a Comment »

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