Tempted by the Mailman

Aaacck!!  What is my mailman trying to do to me???

Three times now he has delivered dirt-y magazines to my house and the images I'm seeing have me climbing the walls!

Oh get your mind out of the gutter!  I said "dirt-y" -

like the stuff you grow plants in - not dirty like something else! 

That's right.  For some reason, I've been besieged with seed catalogs. 

Just look at the color in this layout of the Jung Seed catalog:



This picture of squash is upside down, but I, too, flipped when I saw them in the Baker Creek book.



Why am I stuck eating the white tasteless faux-matos of winter instead of these beauties?



I hate eggplant.  And this kid was really getting on my nerves.  She's on every other page playing with potatoes, cavorting with carrots, and munching on melons.  Why does she get to have the fun and not me??

Look at her eyes.  It's like she's mocking me, the little twerp.

All these lovely images nd I can't do a darn thing with them.  It's only February in Wisconsin.  Too early to even start seeds indoors.

To add insult to injury, we've had unseasonably warm weather here and next to no snow.  It's totally messing up my internal clock.  I've had the feeling for days like I should be throwing windows open for fresh air and spring cleaning. 

But we've got a good three months of winter before I can do any of that. 

And I've got wedding to worry about which means I won't be able to get hardcore in the garden even if I wsanted to. 

So, to satisfy my cravings for dirt, I did my traditional mid-winter project of starting my indoor compost bin. 

Take one garbage can with a lid and holes drilled in the bottom.  Set it inside a drain pan.  Add one layer of shredded paper, a dozens of these guys

and a layer of this

and tape on a note for unsuspecting houseguests....

 And after filling it with my produce scraps and eggshells for the next three months, I'll have a nice big bucket full of compost.   Which, of course, I will use to grow my own pretties....like this

Isn't that the most gorgeous cabbage you've ever seen?  Curses on you Mr. Mailman for bringing those catalogs in February!!!