The weather has been beautiful during the day time but in the high 30s at night. All of the plants have been able to weather the cold nights without any negative effects.

I was ill last weekend so I wasn't able to do any gardening. However, I have been trying to make up for it during the evenings this week. I now have four hanging pots and 10 planters filled with violas. They really add a splash of color to the gardens in the backyard. Also, I have planted two containers of lettuce, one container of radishes, and three containers of carrots. Yesterday, Ken and I planted four cans of potatoes. Two of the cans contain Yukon Golds (early to midseason), one can contains Russet Burbanks (early to midseason), and one can contains Red Norlands (labelled best early season). We filled the containers two-thirds full with a mixture of top soil and composted manure.

We also planted two types of two year old asparagus roots (Jersey King and Mary Washington) several weeks ago. I have wanted to raise this crop for more than thirty years but I never seemed to get around to it. So I decided that this was the year that I would do something about it. Ken dug a long, deep ditch next to the house next to the sunroom. Then he spread out the roots of the plants and put three to four inches of soil over them. On Thursday (April 22), he mixed some of the soil from the trench with the worm compost that he had been making this winter and spread another few inches over the plants. When they begin to emerge from the ground, he'll mound more dirt around them and then we'll add mulch to keep the weeds at bay.

In addition, I started seeds indoors. On Friday, April 16, I sowed six different types of tomato seeds--Lemon Boy, Super Sweet 100, Sungold, 4th of July, Italian Romas, and Jubilee. I have grown all of these varieties in the past except for the Italian Romas. These specific seeds were from Botanical Interests and the label on the package says that they are "an excellent old heirloom tomato used for sauce or canning and that they have firm, meaty 3 inch oblong fruits with few seeds growing on compact determinate vines."

When I went to water these tomatoes on Thursday, I noticed that all of the seeds had already germinated. Last year, the peppers would not grow and I had a feeling that it might be the peat pots that I was using. So yesterday, I decided to try growing peppers again. I planted jalapenos, anchos, and poblanos.