Greetings, Rural Sprout readers, Â How was your week? Were you able to get outside and play in the dirt? Â I heard from so many of you sharing your
gardening exploits last weekend. We love seeing your photos and hearing from you. Keep writing in! I do my best to respond to everyone. Â We had a miserable week here weather-wise. It was cold and rainy. There were several occasions when I looked out my window, and it was sleeting. Â Around Wednesday, I gave up, covered everything planted in the garden with a thick layer of straw and left it covered. It hardly seemed worth the energy to go out and uncover
everything only to have to cover it up again at sundown.  We moved the seedlings into the workshop for the duration and hunkered down ourselves.  I got lots of reading and tea-drinking done.  But now, the extended forecast looks good, and we will have some truly beautiful spring weather.   I went out to the garden this morning, while everything was still covered with dew, and started pulling back the layers of straw.  Everything is hale and hearty, deep emerald green and (most importantly) safe and sound. Even the pepper plants I managed to “kill” the other week are bouncing back with new growth.  I removed the heavy plastic cover from our polytunnel with the intent of folding it up for the season and replacing it with the lighter fabric cover.  In doing so, I managed to dump a pool of shockingly cold water onto my feet. My
footwear of choice this morning?  Birkenstocks and handknit wool socks.  Sigh.  Any family members reading this right now will be grinning and shaking their heads knowingly. It’s a very “me” thing to do.  I
squished around the garden finishing up my chores, and now both socks and my hippie sandals are drying in the sunshine on the deck. Â Yes, it seems spring is well and truly here in central Pennsylvania. My Sweetie hung up the hummingbird feeders, and there were visitors already. Ma Robin is feeding her (terribly ugly) babies in her nest at the corner of the workshop. The violets are starting to open up. And a walk in the woods this morning yielded a handful of
morels.  Does it get any better than this? Sluiced socks and all.  Well, my dears, it’s high time we move those seedlings out of the workshop and into their permanent home. Enjoy the day, and
I hope you have a marvelous week. Â
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Tomatoes are, without a doubt, the most popular vegetable grown in backyard gardens worldwide. And…
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If you want to stir up drama in an online gardening forum, simply ask, "Can you plant peppers deeply…
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If this is your first year of no-dig gardening, congratulations! You are well on your way to less…
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A visit to any trendy food vendor will yield some interesting ingredients on the menu. For example,…
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Cultivating healthy homegrown food, and relying a little bit (or a lot!) less on what industry churns…
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Gardening can be fun and easy, or complicated and frustrating. It all depends on the quality of your…
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Do you even know the number of meals and preserves you can get out of a bumper crop of beets? Or are…
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Pothos, commonly known as Devil's Ivy, is leading the forefront of the recent houseplant boom. For…
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I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Ducks are better than chickens. I know; it hurt me a…
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Keeping chickens on your homestead gives you far more than just eggs (and potentially meat). Chickens…
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Did you miss a
newsletter or want to go back and read a few for inspiration - Click this link. Don't forget
to check out our Facebook page for daily updates.  That's all for this week, Rural Sprout Readers.
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Sincerely, Tracey Besemer Editor
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