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My basement seed starting experiment was going full speed ahead. Tomato, pepper, romaine, spinach and cauliflower plants were plugging along happily when I noticed a few tiny bugs crawling around on the table under the seed trays. I identified them as clover mites, which, as I now know, love to snack on plant material.

I really didn’t want to spray the vegetable plants. A few days later, I was taking care of a handful of these little red bugs. Then more. And even more. So I scouted and picked bugs off plants and the table. Finally, the numbers got too high and I realized I had to do something. But what?

So I sprayed the table with a traditional insecticide and then washed it down with soap and water. I’m not sure if there was permanent damage to the plants, but the bugs are gone and plants seem happy.

Just the thought of all that time and effort of raising those plants going down the drain was breaking my heart. And here are the things I was trying not to think:

• S#!&, I can’t do this because I have a black thumb. Or I don’t have the instinct for plants. I am, of course, ignoring the spathiphyllum that we’ve kept alive for ten years and the five jade plants I’ve propagated from cuttings. Maybe that’s different from growing vegetables from seed?
• I’m just going to go buy plants at a garden center. This whole seed starting adventure has been fun, but there are people who do this for a living. These young plants are so fragile. I’ll just go buy tomato plants.
• I’m just going to buy bell peppers at the grocery store. But what fun is that?
• This is too hard and I’m never doing this again. 

I’m fighting against the urge for instant gratification. Nothing about this process is instant. It’s slow and sometimes steady. It’s teaching me both to fight and to wait and see what happens.

It’s been a few weeks since the clover mite problem, and you can see in the pic, we’re still in business. Just a few more weeks until planting.

Healthier diets! Fresh tomatoes! Less stress! Better life! There are so many benefits of gardening, so we’re building raised garden beds for growing vegetables this summer.

There is a ridiculous amount of research on why gardening is good for you and here’s some of it. A study conducted in the Netherlands showed that gardening can reduce the level of the stress hormone cortisol in your blood. And it can put you in a better mood.

So we’re going to lower our stress levels…right after we raise them with all these decisions about these garden beds. Seems like a simple project, but all the options are stacking up.

We’ve only had small patio containers of tomatoes in the past, which were not so successful, so we are going to let the wealth of knowledge on the internet guide us.

Location, location, location. Where should we put these beds? Our first option was an area that gets really intense full sun on a steep slope, but we’re going to go with a spot with slightly less sun but one that is much flatter. Selecting this spot will cut down on construction time and may even help with irrigation needs.

Building material. This is going to be a wood project. The internet tells me that corrugated steel, bricks and stone can also be used, but we’re going with wood. Pressure-treated wood, railroad ties and old utility poles are not good options, because chemicals from them can leach into your roots and crops. Gross.

We thought we’d be using cedar, which is a popular option, but the guy at the lumber yard suggested spruce. It’s a whole lot cheaper, so that sounds good to me.

I think Growing North’s raised beds are are gorgeous.

Blanket city. It happens. #gardenchat pic.twitter.com/SogtQFVKuc

— Growing North (@growingnorth) March 22, 2016

Size and shape. I don’t want to start with an overwhelming space, but every time I pick up the seed catalog, I circle another crop. Oops. I’m hungry.

Anyway, I’m starting out the design using square foot gardening methods. At first I thought we would have a big c-shaped bed, but now it seems that rectangular-shaped beds are the best idea. Easy access to all areas.

Tell me, internet, when you say that some crops shouldn’t be grown together (tomatoes and cauliflower, for example), how far away do these plants need to be from each other? Opposite sides of an 8 foot bed ok? Or do they need to be in separate beds? Main question: two long beds or three medium-length beds?

Soil. Soil is tricky. In-ground garden beds are a lot of work around here because our soil is heavy clay and a mess. We’ve had topsoil and mulch delivered, but we’re going to need to find some nice compost for this project. Looking for a really amazing supplier for soil.

Crops. I started looking at a mail order catalog for seeds. I made my selections based on space and what kind of vegetables we want, but then I looked at the prices and realized it’s a lot cheaper to buy them at a garden center or home improvement store. They aren’t exactly the varieties I was looking for, but we’ll give them a try.

We have happy tomato, green pepper and romanesco seeds planted and sprouted. I planted lettuce and spinach seeds last night. I’ll be starting cucumber, squash and corn in the next month. And an onion in my pantry has sprouted, so I’ll fit that in somewhere. Another post on seed starting coming soon.

I’m planning to plant towards the end of May, so lots of decisions to be made and work to be done before then. I love trolling around Instagram this time of year to see the baby sprouts people are nurturing. Check out #seedstarting. So great. Less stress for everyone!

My lettuce seedlings are doing extremely well under grow lights. I had been having the same problem I often have with seedlings — sad, spindly growth, even after a few weeks.

I put a new batch of romaine ‘Freckles’ seedlings under lights 20 days ago. Just after my last update, I noticed that the roots of the seedlings had reached the outside of the peat pots I’d planted them in, so I transplanted the seedlings into bigger pots. Here’s what they looked like then and now.

The time to maturity is 55 days, so we’ll see how it goes. In summary: Grow lights are awesome.