Seed Swapping Fun!

The past weekend was alot of fun in spite of the cold weather!  I hosted a Seed Swap & Cocktail Party on Saturday night for my gardening group "Grownups Playing in the Dirt".  It was an evening of meeting lots of new faces and getting a ton of new seeds to try.  I was impressed by the amount of guests I had (24!) and the amount of seeds and good food everyone brought.  I ended up with all flower seeds since growing flowers from seed is something new for me.  For others, veggies were the attraction.  It's a great way to meet people and try something new for free!  My home is tiny, but the husbands were able to start a campfire out back (with a propane weed torch, I might add, lol!) and we were able to spill outside around the fire for some extra room.  It was chilly, but no wind at least.  Soon enough we will be complaining about the heat and mosquitoes!  There were alot of kids so they kept busy running around the yard, as all kids should be doing...and I am sure they all went home exhausted!  Outdoors and tired...nature's ADHD remedy!  I intended to snap some photos of the event, but forgot all about it once the party started.  My seedlings under lights are still too immature to send out into the world, so now I have an excuse to have another party in May!  Speaking of the seedlings, here they are as of this morning:

The rest of the weekend was spent cross-legged on my graveled perennial beds with my kids and dogs weeding.  Not exactly exciting, but very relaxing nonetheless.  The kids were so helpful in fact, hauling my debris in their little red wagon to the compost pile, that I offered to take them out to dinner and let them pick.  They chose, of course, McDonald's...yuck, what is it about that place and kids?!!  Anyway, they got their wish and all I got was my body desperately wanting its gallbladder back!  I am noticing that my kids now know what is a weed and what is a plant, important since alot of my perennials are self-sowing babies all around them!  

Yesterday, my best friend calls and is thinking about apple trees for her yard instead of trees that "don't do anything" and it got me thinking!  She has room for some nice trees and for them to provide food is awesome, but I am afraid if I add any more trees to my backyard it will shade my veggies.  After some researching, I decided to order some Colonnade Apple Trees.  If you haven't seen them, they seem to be the perfect solution to add fruit for the family without shading the yard, or would be great for tiny gardens as you can even pot them on a deck.  I ordered 3 of different varieties, and will try and update on the status of them to see if they live up to expectations!  Click for a picture and article about Colonnade Apple Trees, and a video from P. Allen Smith.  Now I can't wait for them to get here...funny thing is, the day after I ordered mine, a post appeared about them on one of my favorite blogs "The Crunchy Chicken".  So at least I'm not alone in trying this strange variety!

I am hoping to get the rest of my garden weeded and start on our fence building this week, but it is still cold and supposed to rain tomorrow...ugh!