Tag: Gardening

Grow This: West Virginia Garden Challenge
Gardening · Homesteading · Urban Homesteading

Grow This: West Virginia Garden Challenge

Sarah

I saw the 2025 Grow This: West Virginia Garden Challenge in winter and signed up for it before we moved (Since I had the local address to use!).

I love free seeds, the challenge of growing, and the chance to show off (I am pretty competitive with gardening). Mary’s Heirloom Seeds provided the seeds this year.

I received my seeds in the mail, even though I signed up to pick them up in person at the local library. They had a few issues with the distribution this year. Nothing huge, but some participants never received their cards in the mail (I didn’t and was about to pick them up in person when I found them in my mailbox). But there were no issues; I had my seeds in hand, so it was time to plant.

So what is it?

The Throwdown is a statewide competition that aims to get West Virginians to move more, grow their own food, and crush hunger in our state. Participants complete challenges to earn points for their counties. Some challenges are simple, like donating vegetables to a food pantry. Others are more involved, like organizing a seed library or building a Grow This-themed float for a local parade. The competition is supported by grant funds for these types of educational programs. 

This is something that hits me deep in my love of growing food. Sharing knowledge and helping others become more self-sufficient builds resilient communities. When people have a skill set, they become more confident in life.

It has been freezing the past few days (it got down to 27 one night), so I used my pop-greenhouse to start the seeds.

I planted about half the Mesclun Lettuce seed in 4″ pots.

The Chives I did two pots worth (plenty of chives!)

The Pickling Cucumbers had fewer seeds, so I started all the seeds.

I’ll have enough seed for the lettuce for a late summer start to have early fall lettuce.

I will transplant them into my container garden once they have sprouted. But for now, they will stay warmer in the shelter and exposed to natural light. As I mentioned, I gave up most artificial lighting years ago, as I have long felt that plants are stronger when grown under natural light (the sun).

So here is to a successful sprouting – and updates as the growing season continues.

~Sarah

Starting A Container Garden
Gardening · Homesteading · Urban Homesteading

Starting A Container Garden

Kirk Kirkconnell

It’s been just over a week since I arrived in West Virginia.  The younger two boys, the cat, and I flew out at the end of March. Kirk, the oldest son and the dogs, drove across the country.

In early March, Kirk and I had driven across the US and I had planted a couple things before we flew back. Everything made it except for the strawberry 🍓 plants. They didn’t get enough rain, as they were just bit too far back. But that wasn’t a huge loss financially. I’ll get my alpine strawberry seeds going this week.

I love 5 gallon buckets for pepper plants 🫑, this frame I found at Home Depot slightly classed it up. I decided to treat myself.

We were here a few days when the first drop of shipped items showed up, from the U-Haul boxes:

We had sent thru 10 of these, and a lot of my garden gear was in them.
With time to spare, I started building on the lower patio.
I had ordered another pop-up greenhouse so I could start seeds quickly.
Fully built and weighted down, with it being the second one Alistaire has built, it went up fast.
Bricks, blocks, or pavers hold down the cover to protect from the wind. It’s even windier here in WV than it was on Whidbey Island.
I set up a potting area so I could make soil and get going on filling pots.

The cheapest potting trays are cement mixing trays. I found 2 sizes locally at Home Depot. It gives me one for soaking coconut coir, which is handy. The work table I had shipped through, though I almost didn’t. I am glad I did!

Clancy Potatoes 🥔 and Hedou Bok Choy seeds started today.
The last frost date is later than I am used to, so it has bought me time to seed and plant. I am now in grow zone 7a, where as I used to be in grow zone 8b
Yukon Gold and Blue potatoes 🥔 that I bought in early March, I got into pots this past week. They were definitely ready to be planted!
With my garden gear there, I started filling my grow bags. This morning, I seeded Tom Thumb dwarf green peas 🫛 outside. They are cold hardy.

I have in the container garden so far:

2 kinds of potatoes, 2 blueberries, 2 grapes, 4 containers garlic, and 2 of peas. In the greenhouse, more has and will be seeded. The weather predicts freezing temperatures a couple of nights this week, so I stay patient. Soon, it’ll be lettuce and pea harvesting time, and then to plant tomatoes 🍅 and peppers outside.

There’s nothing wrong with extensive container gardening. It lets one grow, but not have to build the infrastructure. You can work it around everything else that is crushing you and not feel overwhelmed by it. Meanwhile, as we settle in, I have taken a few moments to walk our land and to think where the permanent gardens will go in.

– Sarah

Growing Garlic 🧄 From One Area To The Next
Gardening · Homesteading · Urban Homesteading

Growing Garlic 🧄 From One Area To The Next

neverfreefarm

As winter waned, and spring approached, I realized a sad thing:

I had either planted or sold all the garlic from summer of 2024. I had none to take with me, to our new place. The worst part is? I had been thru this before, on our last move. I had planted garlic in the fall of 2017 and left in the spring of 2018, taking none with me.

As I packed I found a tiny bulb of garlic. Little slivers for the cloves, but I figured at least I had something to grow.

In early March, I planted it on a visit out East when we drove our RV to West Virginia. I had found an old broken-down wheelbarrow downat the bottom of our land:

Just add in broken pieces of pottery lying next to it for drainage….

I asked a couple of friends, jokingly, “did you have any of the garlic you bought from me, that you didn’t plant?”

Well…my friend Linda actually did.

Gorgeous. And well preserved still.
It was some of the best I had grown last year. Huge bulbs.

I packed it in my suitcase and flew across the US with it, as I left WashingtonState.

The first day in West Virginia, I walked to the “garden” area in the back yard and saw this:

It had sprouted in the 4 weeks since I had planted it. And survived with no watering, except for the rain.

That made me smile. I went shopping and picked up 2 large containers, and planted the rest I had brought.

Now all the garlic I brought is planted.

The garlic won’t grow as big as fall planted, but it will produce seed for next fall, where I can produce a viable crop next year, to keep my Whidbey Red garlic going! And that was all that matters. To keep it going. And hopefully by next spring the new gardens will be built. And ready to grow as much as I want.

~Sarah

Spring Slides In
Gardening

Spring Slides In

neverfreefarm

I sit here, thinking about the weather in Western Washington State. For a big event is being touted by every meteorologist right now “The skies will fall!”. Sitting on a rock in the Salish Sea, in the Olympic Rainshadow, I’ll sit and wait. Is it winter hollering back one more time? It should be a good one along the Cascade Mountains, but spring is here. The overly excited predictions are hail, rain and tornadoes. I’ll go for rain being the major event. Maybe I’ll be wrong. I hope not.

In a few more weeks, the bad weather will be forgotten as all the trees open, flowers surging. Already the first blossoms 🌸 are almost here. The rhubarb is coming up quickly. Life is returning.

Peach tree 🍑 It’s often the first to bloom. It’ll open next week and hopefully avoid any rain storms.
The Lilac tree might be covered in lichen and moss, but it’s leaves are days from unfurling.

The birds are out singing, even as the weather starts to turn this afternoon. As my time in Washington State winds down, I’m happy to get to see the start of spring, then see it again in West Virgina soon.

~Sarah

First Sign Of Spring
Gardening

First Sign Of Spring

Sarah

There is something about the end of February as the first green stalks come up from flower bulbs in the Pacific Northwest.

Sometime in early March, the first flowers open, and for the next month, the bulbs continue until the tulips end it.

The wind might be blowing, the rain dumping, but spring is coming.

~Sarah