What's Going On?

It's the beginning of April, time to clear out the winter's weeds and start thinking about spending time outside. Despite living in sunny California, I have spent the last 4 months primarily indoors, catching up on scrapbooking and other projects. But this spring weather is pulling me outside.

I've got broccoli and cabbage that is finally starting to take off. I planted it in February and it seemed like it was going to sit there forever and do nothing. I need this to be done and harvested by June 1st, otherwise I'll have to do some rearranging of things that were supposed to be planted here:

I have to say, my spring peas are a disappointment.  Granted, the seeds are a year old, but I've been known to get 3 years out of Johnny's.  It's how I justify the cost.  But my germination rate on these peas is under 50%.  I may try replanting some, or I may just say screw it.  And so continues my love/hate relationship with English peas!

On the bright side, I've finally found something that is happy in these wine barrels.  Shallots!  They were planted in the fall.  They'll stay there until June.  I'm hoping what I pull up is a nice crop of shallots to last the year.

On the horizon are my tomato plants.  These are at the 4 week stage from the day I planted the seeds.  They don't seem to be too big yet, and I'm only 4-6 weeks from wanting to get them in the ground.  But I'm reminding myself that once they start to take off, they grow fast.

My peppers are still in the infant stage.  I don't plan to plant them in the garden until 6/1 so I think they're just about right in terms of timing.

And even though my parsley and basil did horribly last year, I'm going to try again.  Most of them went into the wine barrels, so this year, I'll plant them in a sunnier spot and see if they do better.