Grow Along Week 11

Howdy everyone!

Things just keep on growing here! We hope the weather where you are has turned favorable and that your gardens are plumping up as nicely as ours are! Our weather has been so nice that we've been able to start on a few other homestead projects in addition to the ever important planting and nurturing of crops. With no further ado, check out what we've got going on this week!

Grow-Along Week 10

Howdy folks!

So, it has been a rainy week here which means lots of things are sprouting up and putting all kinds of energy into plumping up and producing. I've been enjoying a little guilty pleasure in the rain since not much can be done outdoors and I've been spending a good bit of time with some good books (seriously good books... hit me up if you want the titles). I did manage to snap some good pics yesterday between rainstorms, so this post might be a little light on pics compared to the last few since rain and cameras don't mix well. ;)

Grow-Along Week 8

Happy Beltane / May Day everyone!

May is always a turning point for all of our preparations. In just another week, our little tomatoes and peppers will be moving to the raised beds outside and many of our other veggie and fruit varieties will be planted from seed. We are so thrilled to be able to plant all of our gardens with plants we grew from seeds ourselves this year! What are your biggest accomplishments in planning or planting so far?

Grow-Along Week 7

Howdy friends!

The grow-splosion is still going on strong at the Micro-Farm! Green things are popping up everywhere! It is tough to keep up with it all in pictures, but we are trying our best to keep you updated on all the excitement. Spring brings such amazing and busy energy and we just love it!

We have had some friends who are new to gardening ask us for help identifying the seedlings that are popping up in their gardens as weeds or plants that they intentionally planted. So, the biggest focus of today's Grow-Along update will be helping you all to identify your little plantlets by showing you pictures of ours. We hope that our pictures will give you a good representation of what seedlings for common garden varieties look like so that you don't accidentally weed out the good plants.

Grow Along Week 5

Howdy everyone!

It is finally starting to feel like Spring here in Pennsylvania! We've been busy as bees lately cleaning up beds, planting seeds, planning new gardens, and getting new plants planted and situated. The energy here is amazing! :) As a result of all this, we've got a HUGE update for you all this week and we hope you'll be delighted to see how much is growing here. We would love to see what you are growing as well, so please do send us an email or Facebook message to share your gardening progress. Our goal with this blog and our Facebook page is really to create a community where we can all share ideas, techniques, and hopefully produce (seeds, fruits, veggies, etc) in the future.

Grow-Along Week 4

Our daffodils are about to bloom!

 Howdy everyone!
We've got some super-exciting news today that we just can't wait to share with you all! We're so excited that we can't even wait till after we show you the new pictures from our grow-room! Sarah (that's me) signed up to captain a screening of the new movie, Open Sesame: The Story of Seeds at the Crown Center Stadium 14 Cinema on Tuesday, April 29, 2014 at 7:30 PM. One of our primary goals at The Dusty Rose Micro-Farm is to achieve as close to a self-sustaining farm as possible. That means that we intend to save our own seed, start our own plants for food, and be able to repeat the cycle indefinitely as many of our ancestors did before us. There are many companies out there in the world of big agribusiness that would prefer to see that seeds be regulated and controlled, patented, modified, and restricted in use. Join us in screening this wonderful documentary that discusses the importance of seed freedom and helps to show us all how we can be involved in making the choice as to what kind of food we grow and consume. The showing is a special one-night-only screening and you do need to reserve your tickets ahead of time. The movie will not be shown if we do not get enough seats reserved for the showing. Book your tickets now (don't worry, your credit card will not be charged until or if we reach the number needed to guarantee the showing) and join us for this special event!!
Reserve your tickets today at: http://gathr.us/screening/7731

Grow-Along Week 2

Happy Spring!! It is finally here! We made it!

So, we're super excited this week to share our growing progress with you. This week confirms a lot of the earlier suspicions that we'd written about when we talked about past seed-starting failures. The combination of excellent soil and a much better growing light have definitely solved our problems!

Two weeks into our seed-starting adventure and we are proud to report that we have a total of 56 little plantlets in our grow-room. We have some that already have their second set of true leaves coming in and they all look so much stouter and heartier than any seedlings we've ever started before! We are simply jumping for joy!

Grow-Along Week 1

Spring daffodils are coming up!

Hi again, Micro-Farm Family!
Welcome to Week 1 of our Grow-Along! We're super excited to announce that we have seedlings to show you! It seems our peppers and tomatoes have sprouted right on schedule and are being rather cooperative for the timeline we set for the Grow-Along updates. Also, we thought it would be fun to have a little contest since we've got a rather unusual plant getting ready to put on a display in our grow-room.

Let's Get Growing!

Can you guess what time it is?

We are excited to announce a new feature on the blog today! But first, just a quick reminder to our friends and followers in Zone 6 - you need to start your seeds for peppers, tomatoes, onions, and other heat-loving plants this week if you haven't done so already! (Find your growing zone here!) This week puts those of us in Zone 6 at the critical seed-starting time for plants that need a long warm season in order to fruit. You'll want to get seeds started for those types of plants now to ensure that they have approximately 8 weeks of grow-up time to be ready to plant as soon as the first frost date has passed. If you start the seeds too late, your plants won't have enough time to set fruit and produce before the cool season starts again in the fall. Also, pea planting will be just around the corner! My Pap-Pap Jack always planted his peas on St. Patrick's Day (March 17th) to ensure the best harvest as peas should be planted outdoors a few weeks before the last frost. 

Moving along, we'd like to give a warm shout-out to our good friend, Mary Jane Bigley who recently commented on our interest poll to let us know that she is very excited to have some land to garden but is looking for some beginner tips and hints. (Hi Mary Jane!!) Her comment gave us the idea to host a grow-along. So, here we go! We now declare an opening to the first annual Dusty Rose Micro-Farm Grow-Along! So, here's how it works. We'll be posting weekly updates on what plants we have started, what varieties we are growing, and share progress pictures of our plants as they grow and fruit. You share your planting/growing progress with us in the comments on our blog, via our Facebook page, or by email and we will feature your pictures and stories once a week in our weekly Grow-Along post! :) The Grow-Along post will be featured on our blog every Thursday. The exciting thing about this kind of community project is that even though some of us live in very different areas, we can all learn from each other and support one another along the way! So... Let's Get Growing!! :)

Preparing for Spring

So, I don't know about you, but I'm SO ready for spring to get here!

Here in Southwestern PA, the last couple of months have been a weather roller-coaster. We've had everything from 60° and sunny to -12° and icy. I don't know about you, but I sure am ready for sunshine, longer days, and warmer weather.

This time of year I always start to get anxious and tend to jump ahead of myself (and Mother Nature!) on my spring planting. The feed stores and hardware stores have started stocking seeds and growing supplies, and I find it so hard to avoid jumping in headlong and getting started right away. I just keep reminding myself that plants started indoors this time of year will outgrow their pots far too soon and it will still be too cold to move them outside by the time they do.