I'm feeling better today. I really wasn't feeling very good yesterday. I tried not to complain but, honestly, my mouth where the dentist worked on my tooth hurt so bad I wanted to cry. Today I'm a little sore but at least I could eat without getting sick to my stomach. It's just me - I don't handle needles very well. I'm such a big baby!! I can't help it though, it hurt.
I went downstairs today and got my plant light-stand out and dusted it off. I'm getting it out of the cold garage and into the basement where it will be much warmer. I'm working on my little plant pots making sure they are all clean and ready to go. The first week of March I will start planting seeds. I figure it will take 6-8 weeks for the majority of the plants to grow and be ready to harden off, which would mean they should be ready to plant sometime around the first part of May. Supposedly the last frost for our area is right around April 20. We will probably plant our peas and lettuce about the middle of April and then the rest of the garden the first part of May. We, of course, will wait at least another 2-4 weeks before we plant the sweet potatoes. The soil needs to be good and warm before sweet potatoes are planted. We are moving our garden around this year due to the fact that we have been planting the same type plants in the same place for a couple years. We do this to confuse the bugs. We don't want to let them get too used to coming back to the same place for lunch!!!
This part of gardening is the most nerve-wracking part for me because I am not very good at starting seeds. I'm getting better, but it's really important that I get it right this year. I want to know that next year I'll be on top of it because I'm going to be saving ALL my seeds this fall from our own garden produce. Next year I'm hoping to cut my garden costs by more than half. Big garden dreams - I know - we'll see how it goes.