It’s been unusually warm this weekend, and overall we’ve had a very mild winter so far. Temperatures were in the mid-fifties yesterday and the sun was shining. Although today was supposed to follow in the same wonderfully warm fashion, the weather-woman changed the forecast at the last minute. It’s still in the mid-forties, but the wind is fierce and it’s just started sprinkling. Comparing this weather to last year’s deep snows, intense ice and brutal temperatures, one can’t help but be happy.
My garden interest calendar tends to follow the same pattern each year. Something like this:
January/February – Oh, won’t it be fun when it’s warmer and the garden gets going?
March/April – I CANNOT wait until we get some vegetables out! What? We’ve got lettuce and greens coming in? Alright! Salad for every meal.
May/June – We’ve planted a lot, but we’re not picking much of anything. I hate the dreaded early summer lull.
July – Oh my goodness, I love tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers. I love my garden.
August – When are these dang tomatoes going to quit!? I swear they’re doing it just to mock me. I’d love a night or weekend day that isn’t focused solely around picking, scalding or canning.
September/October/November/December – Do not speak the word garden to me.
Since I’m back into the mindset of being excited of the upcoming garden season and we’ve had such mild weather, I’ve been thinking dirty. Err… garden dirty I mean. So, I got out my shovel and started working. I cleared out all of the old, dead vegetable vines from the garden, turned over the soil in the rows of the hot-bed garden and worked some organic material and compost in.
As an added bonus, I started cleaning out the old growth from some containers around the property. When I pulled at this dead planter, I got a wonderful surprise!
Jerusalem artichokes! I got these from a friend last year and totally forgot that I had planted them. When I pulled out the large stalks, the wonderful roots (a potato-like vegetable) came to the top of the soil. I harvested a small batch, and plan to wash them up and cook them this week.
What have you been doing to work or plan for the upcoming months?
hensandhoney.wordpress.com 
I’ve also been busily cleaning and hoeing up my garden in preparation for spring. I’ve started quite a few seeds in the green house, and am now biding my time doing some spring cleaning around the ranch, and doing a few DIY projects! Your garden plot looks fabulous! And I’ve never grown artichokes.. Are they hard to grow? How do you use them?
Blessings –
~ Aspen