Winter garden – The Salem Garden

“The Ice Skating Pond Is Like a Garden”…

said my brother-in-law on the phone the other day… “think about it Michele, it’s all dependent on the weather, it all depends on if it rains or snows and if it’s warm or cold, it’s just like gardening, your always waiting to see how it’s going to go.”

He’s right, it is just like that. Michael and the kids worked hard to cut back the vegetation on the pond this fall.

It looked like this when they started. They cut and sawed and dug and moved everything out to create a nice big space for the rain to fill with water. Then we prayed for rain. It took awhile but now…

we have a skating pond. They’re spending hours out there having a ball!

Hockey is a very big focus…

This guy lives for the sport.

My little girl is more of a figure skater but she was keeping up with the stick pretty well today.

It does my heart good to look down and see this.

I took pictures and cheered them on. The afternoon sun warmed me up and gave me energy…

so I could climb back up this hill…

and head inside to look over seed catalogs and think abut the gardens ahead. While I’m doing that I’ll keep hoping and praying for ice friendly weather.

Life is so, so good here in our winter garden.

Enjoy everything!

Michele

Winter Lettuce and Spinach On the Rooftop!

I’d like to introduce the “other blog” in my life! Bass River Gardens is the blog that I’ve created with the individuals who I work with in my position as an adaptive gardening specialist. Last week we planted an experiment in our new “cold frame” and I thought it might be a good time to share Bass River here on The Salem Garden. This is a really cool project and so easy to do! Check it out, and while your there please look at some of the other posts that we’ve created and follow us! We’re having a good time in the Bass River Gardens, even in the cold weather! Michele

Bass River Gardens

We made a cold frame for our rooftop garden a few weeks ago. A cold frame is like a little greenhouse and it’s used to extend the growing season by keeping in the heat and keeping out the cold, snow and wind. We made ours very inexpensively using window well covers, metal clips and bungie cords. You can watch the video that showed us how to do it here.

We decided to try to grow different kinds of lettuce and spinach to see what varieties would grow best in the cold frame.

We made labels for each packet of seeds,

Then we went up to the roof, lifted the cover off and got ready to plant.

Each set of seeds was gently planted.

And carefully marked with a white label.

When we were done planting we had five varieties of lettuce and three types of spinach ready to grow!

We…

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Process or Product?— I’m a Process Gardener

I’m sorry, I’ve been away, lost in the realm of back to school routines and commitments that make me run (sometimes literally) from 6 am to 9pm most days. I need to get back to my blog so I’m going to jump right in and just talk about what I’m thinking about today. I’ve been tossing around the idea that I am a “process” gardener. In other words I love the process of planning the garden, planting and growing things. The end product is not that important to me. I enjoy the fruit of my labor but producing a zillion tomatoes is not my goal. The enjoyment for me comes from the act of gardening. I think that this is very different from gardeners who have their eye on the prize at the end and consider the work it takes to get there to be hard labor. It isn’t ever hard for me. I can weed, water and prune all day and love every second of it. If I loose to the conditions, so be it, I’m okay with that. I have to stock my freezer with dinners in the spring because I know I won’t want to come inside and cook. I just love being out there.

What I’m not too okay with is the idea that it’s almost over. Fall in New England is really beautiful but I get hit with a little case of the blues at this time of the year. I just can’t believe that summer is ending. Where did it go? Do I really have to wait through three long seasons for it to return? That seems like forever right now.

Okay, enough wining… there’s still a ton of work to do. We have broccoli, lettuce, Brussel sprouts and herbs growing . I’m planning some winter gardening activities to keep things busy. I have lots of window space here in my new office that my rosemary plant, geraniums and other herbs will love. Maybe I’ll finally get a cold frame going and stay in the game for a longer season. At the very least I could add some new houseplants and spend some more time reading garden blogs from the southern hemisphere.

It may be fall but spring will be here before we know it, right?

What kind of gardener are you?

Be well and enjoy everything.

Michele