Garden/Kitchen Engineering

Today I cut the dahlia tuber in half and put both halves in a big pot inside. I planted the "Peas-in-a-Pot" on the deck in, you guessed it, a pot. I cut down some of the chives (thinned out scraggly ones) and planted some new seeds right in that pot. It's in the sixties today! Beautiful to be working on the deck, and a huge change from yesterday's 30 degrees. I am cleaning and organizing like mad today and part of the project has been to make platforms by the 2 south facing windows in my kitchen/living/dining room. I had 2 pieces of a shelving unit we got for Nate so I put one on the back of the futon/sofa resting against the window sill and it is the perfect size for the serving tray I'm already using for plants under the grow lights. It's great - I just pick up the whole tray and plop it by the window during the day, then move it back at night when we use the couch. Below the other window I moved some plastic drawers I've had since the days of my high school dorm room (now housing seed packets and garden gloves), and with an igloo cooler on top it's the right height for the other shelf. It would be prettier if we just had a nice cabinet or shelving unit there but since I spent all my money on seeds I now have to improvise.

Base made from clementine box

Egg carton water trays

Transplanting Morning Glories

New home!

Grow Lights

I made the mistake of starting morning glories inside in February. They outgrew the grow light setup in my parent's basement almost immediately. I've been trying to figure out where to put them and what they can climb indoors and realized they can just climb the standing grow light in my kitchen. I've never liked that lamp very much (also from my high school dorm, one of those Target ones with flexible arms and multicolored plastic shades). The real challenge (leading to the contraption I'm most proud of) was creating a base for the plants to sit on, as the lamp's base is not flat. My building materials were limited (I didn't want to have to get out of my pajamas for this project) so I cut a gape wide enough for the lamp's neck into a clementine box with my Leatherman's saw blade, then turned the box upside down and covered it with plastic vegetable bags. A lot of tape and an elastic headband were enough to attach this flat platform firmly to the base of the lamp. Then to create trays for the little plant pots, I cut the tops off two plastic Rhody Naturals egg cartons (which I was just cursing yesterday for their lack of recyclability!). I taped them upside down on either side of the lamp's neck and they're just about the right size for three square 1 pint plastic pots on each side. I'm going to have to hope these are big enough for a morning glory or two each!