Last year when I went to harvest my carrots I was very disappointed that I had not thinned out the carrot seeds that my sons had helped me plant.  Several of them were no more than carrot tooth picks.  A few good ones, but for the most part, a lot of green, but very little orange.

So this year the kids still helped me, but we were much more careful on our spacing.  We have also not harvested them all at once, but rather a few at a time as we need them.  Fortunately I have a carrot loving, vegetable harvesting, goofball who loves to pull carrots up.  So he helped me with a few beautiful ones.

Behold, the good.

I waited too long to transplant some of my blocks.  I’ve just had too much going on.  Thankfully there have not been any casualties of my neglect… yet… but it’s kind of surprising.  I have also not been running any kind of fan on these so the fact that they are so tall without wind stress makes for a little weaker stems.  I’m hoping… HOPING… this doesn’t bite me in the butt.

I mean, come on, these basils are monsters and instead of being “air pruned” by the nature of the blocks, the roots expanded to the blocks next to them because they were too close together.  Hmmm…  Behold what NOT to do.  Waiting too long on seedlings, aka the bad.

I’m still not done, I’ve got another 20 or so pepper plants to get transplanted.  One of the beds (bed #3, the old broccoli bed), is almost ready to get spring planted.  I will try and at least capture pictures as I put the ollas in and build the trellises for the tomatoes and cucumbers.  Lots of work to do and of course, a lot of experimenting.  It’s a learning experience.

Now of course, even though I had some pretty carrots… they tend to have a mind of their own.  Their is no way to supervise the subterranean wanderings of the carrot root.  So sometimes, they come out a little strange.  The short stubby one at the top of the picture was dubbed, “the carrot butt”, by some dinner guests.  Nice.

Our non-winter continues and at this point I think I can start spring planting without risk.  I will go ahead and start and will end up staggering the plantings anyway, just because of the volume of work.

Either way, it’s a great time in the garden.  Any time I can get my hands into the dirt is a good day!