Garden 2014: Snow Edition

In spite of today's snow (and last week's, and the week before's, and before that...), our garden is already coming along. 

This is what the garden looked like for most of the winter. We covered the beds with straw in the fall. By Christmas, nearly everything was done except for the kale, which made it until the cold snap in January where we had temperatures down around zero degrees. Sunday, Michael turned three beds over, working the straw into the soil. I planted peas, potatoes, and onions.

I planted garlic last fall and it is coming up. A few of them have cold damage on the ends of their leaves, but they are otherwise thriving.

I also planted spinach last fall in one of the cold frames. Remarkably, it survived just fine. It grew too slowly to pick every day over the winter, but now that it is a bit warmer and the days are getting longer, I'm having it in my salads almost every day.

I planted a number of different cool season crops (kale, broccoli, cauliflower, brussels sprouts, etc) in the other cold frame about a month ago. Last year I found that the cool season vegetables I started outside in the cold frame were much stronger than those I started inside. This is a radish sprout.

Inside, our kitchen table is covered with paper cups and heat mats. I have started my tomatoes. These are Brandywines. I also have Cherokee Purples, Henderson Pinks, Sun Gold Cherry Tomatoes, and Austin Pears.

My leeks are a couple of weeks old.

 Lettuce just starting to come up.

In a sure sign that winter is ending, my hellebores are blooming.