Lettuce in Cold Frame???

I have a problem.... I can not turn down free plants. It doesn't matter if I have space to plant to them... I just simply can not turn them down.

Last night our professor offered us lettuce, cabbage,  and broccoli starts.  I do not have a garden to plant them in but how could I turn down free plants???

I was conservative I only brought home three types of lettuce and some cabbage... that's not bad right?

Free plants ... Lettuce and Cabbage

On my hour drive home from class I started thinking where could I put these new plants. I have a cold frame out back and decided to give that a shot.

Went to Target and bought clear plastic shoe boxes and drilled six holes in the bottom of them thinking they might make good containers or trays for my lettuce. At $1.22 a piece it was worth a shot

Plastic Shoe boxes  with holes for drainage

Then I simply filled them up with potting soil and stuck in the lettuce and cabbage. I have a feeling the cabbage may get a little bit too big for its britches in the box, but it is worth a shot.  Had a few extra cabbage plants so I put them out in the front with a *FREE* sign. I guess we'll see who else likes free plants 

Anyone else want some free plants? 

. I'm hoping this works and I can have some fresh lettuce and salad all winter long. Anyone else have any luck growing lettuce this way? 

Dwarf Orchard

Greetings and many apologies for disappearing.  I underestimated how much time going back to school and working full time would take.  I have missed writing and have made a promise and plan to keep Adventures updated.  I have a lot of new and fun things to share.

On the top of my list to share with you all is my latest obsession, a Dwarf Orchard. At least that is what I am calling my problem of buying trees and having no yard to put them in.

The Dwarf Orchard set up

I decided to purchase some shelves to add to my indoor hallway garden. This spot gets sunlight from both the SE facing window you see and another one across the hall from it facing South.  Seemed to me to be the perfect spot.

I am already the proud owner of a  Kaffir lime tree, which is about a year old. I have greatly enjoyed its leaves this summer (a subject of another post) and am looking forward to its bumpy fruit.  So naturally a lemon tree would provide a nice companion right?

Enter a 3 year old Meyer Lemon tree. Ok I may have ever so slightly misjudged the size of the lemon tree. In my minds eye it was totally fitting on those shelves. In reality.... well you can see it gets its own table.  It has some very teeny tiny buds just beginning to form. It takes about 6 months or more to develop from flower to fruit, so I will keep you posted.

3 year old Meyer Lemon Tree

I spent the last weekend in beautiful Temecula California visiting family. Along with Avocados (YUM!) and Wine (post on Wine Country later too) they grow beautiful luscious olives. Is it just me or could you live off a diet of Avocados, Wine and Olives?? Yeah probably just me. I have been wanting an olive tree for as long as I can remember. When I saw a Lucques olive seedling I just had to have it. When things like trees are involved the logistics of luggage just go right out the window. I think my Aunt thought I was a little nuts buying a tree as a souvenir.

1 yr old Lucques olives tree

And simply because I saw one at a college campus conservatory here in Norfolk and I thought it would be cool to have one, a chocolate tree. Sadly, I ordered this tree from Puerto Rico and it apparently kicked and screamed all the way to Virginia and shed EVERY SINGLE leaf... so its really just kind of a Chocolate Stick right now.. I am babying it hoping it will put out more leaves. Fingers crossed

Chocolate "stick" 

Well there you have it, the 4 players so far in my Dwarf Orchard. I'll go into detail more on each on each of them in future posts. 

Tomato, Shallot and Goat Cheese Tart

I know I'm a little early for the tomato harvest, but I made this last night with some tomatoes from the Farmers Market as a "practice run" for my own harvest. You know had to check it out with their tomatoes before I was going to risk some of my own home grown gems ;)

I have got to say, this is tart is well worth using some of your harvest! I made a few tweaks to the recipe I found in my first issue of Heirloom magazine. Are any of you out there reading this magazine as well? If not I highly recommend it. It is put out by the folks at Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, and there are some pretty interesting articles! Not to mention yummy garden recipes...



This tomato tart was so simple. I'll admit, it was a crazy weekend and I had a bunch of studying and homework to do for my horticulture course, and I spend most of Saturday in the garden, so I used store bought pastry dough. But we'll keep that our little secret ;)

Tomato, Shallot and Goat Cheese Tart 
1 large sheet of frozen puff pastry
1/3 cup of goat cheese softened at room temp (I just eyeballed this)
3-4 medium tomatoes sliced and patted dry
2 shallots thinly sliced
chopped basil to sprinkle all over tart 
1 clove of garlic minced 
salt and pepper 
Olive Oil 


1. Thaw pastry dough according to directions. Spray tart pan with non-stick spray (If you don't have a tart pan, the original recipe from Heirloom says to just spread out on cookie sheet and you'll leave an edge to curl up around creating like a boat for the ingredients) 

2. Pre-Heat Over to 400F 


3. Spread the goat cheese on the pastry.  Place tomatoes and shallots all over the goat cheese.  Sprinkle with basil and garlic. Season with salt and pepper. Drizzle about 2 TBsp of Olive Oil over tart. 


4. Bake 20-25 minutes until the crust is brown. Allow to cool for about 10 min before serving. 

Tart after baking

Leftovers kept well over night in the fridge. I zapped the tart in the microwave for 30 seconds and it tasted great!

Well...must go back to study latin names of landscape plants and identify them by their leaves. Of course tomatoes, peppers and herbs aren't on this test...noooo that'd be too easy ;)

I wish you all a wonderful week ahead!

Garden Harvest Basket

Well we are under a tornado warning until 2AM tonight, so that should tell you what kind of weather we're having today. So I thought I'd bring in a little of the garden and share with you this awesome new harvest basket I got! 

I am a a fan of anything hand made and local to be honest with you. I think there is a lost art to local handi-crafts. So I often jump at the chance to get something fun and unique.  I was reading through my new issue of Heirloom (its the quarterly magazine put out by the folks at Baker Creek Heirloom seeds, this was my first issue, and I love it! But thats for another post) and they had a quick blurb about these great harvest baskets for sale on Etsy. When I went to go look they're handmade in North Carolina, which pretty much sold me (okay okay I was sold when they said hand-made wooden garden harvest basket) 

This little beauty is there medium size, and made out of old tobacco wood and hardwood, and the produce can be hosed off prior to bringing it inside. 

Medium sized harvest basket

Now I don't normally like to do any advertisement for anyone on the blog but I just couldn't help share this with you. I'll include the link to their Etsy store so you can at least check it out for yourself! (http://www.etsy.com/listing/100422786/unique-fruit-vegetable-garden-harvesting)

I really can't wait until those little green tomatoes start turning and I can use this to harvest! (That is if the plants don't float away tonight) 

Here are a few more pictures. Please ignore the kitty "sniffing" the basket in the last one. I couldn't keep them away.... 

Seems like the perfect size for a small household garden

Something new ;) 

Supposed to clear up and be in the mid-70s tomorrow...great gardening day! Hope yours is just as wonderful! Cheers! 

Happy Gardening! 

Whatever happened to those tomato seeds?

I've been meaning to update on my tomato seedlings, but it seems like something is always getting in the way. I have somehow inadvertently angered the illness gods this year and have continually been sick, from the flu in Jan to salmonella poisoning in March to a cold ad ear ache I just can't shake the last few weeks. Perhaps I shall have to offer some tomatoes to them as a offering for less sickness next year.

I also finally started classes in Horticulture. Twice a week I spend the evenings after work in the gardens of a Virginia Tech extension center learning to identify plants. I can't complain, the classroom is wonderful!

So onto the tomatoes. If you'll remember I started these indoors hydroponically in Jan (MLK day weekend) and hardened them off outside in my cold frame for most of March and April. I moved them into the garden a few weeks ago and they seem to be thriving.

I gave some away of the plants away at work this year and I had a co-worker tell me how great his is doing. That just made my day! Im happy to hear feedback like that!

I'm a few weeks behind in clearing the new gardens (the interest was low in our community plots this year so I picked up 3 additional plots). Trying to figure out what to put in those. Such a tough problem to have (she smiles)

Onion Update ....

So I went away for the weekend, and came home to some green onions that grew great! I have been changing the water every other day, and that's ALL! I'm serious, they are sitting on my kitchen counter (I have no windows in my kitchen either by the way)

These are them on Sunday (I added three additional ones on Fri)

Just a reminder...these were them on Wednesday

Never Ending Green Onions????

Well I've been MIA again...sorry about that. I had the unfortunate opportunity to get salmonella poisoning late March/Early April and spent some time as a guest of the local hospital. I feel like I've been playing catch up ever since. Sadly my blogging has taken a back seat. I truly hope and plant to start making it a more regular occurrence. Especially this time of year!! :)

Just because I haven't been blogging doesn't mean I have been gardening. This year for some reason they didn't till our community gardens this year, so I had to learn how to do it by hand. Having mostly done pots this was new and umm...back breaking experience. But I got the job done this weekend and started planting. I plan on sharing more of that later

So I recently saw on Pintrest (who else is loving that site??) that if you don't cut up the white parts of green onions and place them in water, they'll continue to grow and produce more green parts to use. So I decided to finally put it to the test, and take you along on the experiment with me.

On Tuesday I made some Quinoa with green onions and avocados.  I placed the white parts of the green onions in water in a cleaned out spice jar I had lying around

Tuesday Evening...

By the time I woke up on Wednesday morning they had already started sprouting some new green parts.

Not the clearest picture but the green onion on the right the dark green part was new overnight

I'm looking forward to seeing how this experiment goes...I'll keep you apprised