Plant A Winter Garden

Now is the time to plant a winter garden. Halloween is next Monday. If you live in a warmer area, like Texas and the deep South, you can plant greens and roots. The frost won't hurt the roots and some of the greens are frost hardy.

If you want to know more about planting a winter garden, read this article from David's Garden Seeds®. Remember that this is for warm areas only, not places where it is below freezing all winter with a lot of snow and ice. You will have to wait for spring to come if you live in an area that gets a real winter.

And if you are ready to purchase Non-GMO seeds from David's Garden Seeds so you can plant a winter garden, here is the link!

If you live in a warm climate, like Texas, you can plant a fall garden and plant a winter garden most years.

Plant A Winter Garden
October 24-October 30, 2022

Monday, October 24, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

So we did plant a winter garden as well as some fall stuff in our hoop houses on both sides of the business and in the back 40.

Good morning! It is already 11am. We have been very busy this morning trying to get so much done. Today is payday for us. It is trying to rain but so far, just a few drops. It is cloudy and the neighboring communities have had rain for several hours but, other than a few sprinkles, we have had nothing. Now Alexa says we will get our rain at 6pm. I went out front and watered everything and then went out back and watered all of the plants and trees near my greenhouse.

The pond is looking better today after yesterday's cleaning. The mini goldfish have grown quite a bit in just over three weeks. I am hoping the koi are not getting them all while they are small. They hide well inside the lily pad pots and elsewhere. The filter seems to be doing fine.

David and I have eye exams this afternoon. I think I waited too long. It is difficult to focus on and see smaller print. We went two years ago so my eyes have gotten worse but that is usually how it goes.

David is not feeling well today so I have been dealing with payroll issues and paid time off (PTO) issues...one person has called in today and another just left early. We leave for the doctor in about 15 minutes. I don't think I will get the final pay stub from the accountant before we leave which means one person does not get paid today. That is upsetting to me.

Well, sure enough I did not get the pay stub in time. David and I got our eyes examined and tomorrow we will go to his cardiologist. Hopefully, it will be as simple as getting David's medication adjusted since he has lost 57 pounds in the past couple of months.

I am so tired and I need some sleep. I did not sleep well last night. Also, I am hating the heat again. We never got rain today and it is 8:30pm. It is 82° and no rain is expected tonight. I am glad I went out and watered all of my plants and trees this morning.

Our outdoor guy was absent again today and with us gone all afternoon, not much got done today about planting a winter garden. Here, it is still summer again.

Tonight, at 9:30pm, my neighbor called and said the police were chasing illegal aliens through the neighborhood and caught one in another neighbor's yard. That was a bit scary. On top of it, the wind was blowing so after that, I kept hearing loud noises outside. It took me two hours to fall back to sleep.

Tuesday, October 25, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

Our asparagus bed has some brown and some green ferns. Once the first frost hits, you should cut them all down about 1 inch from the ground. Then wait for spring and more asparagus!

It is 60° Fahrenheit this morning and the air feels amazing, like fall should feel. We are getting ready to leave the farm to go to the cardiologist this morning.

We went to the cardiologist's office. The doctor looked at the labs from 12 days ago and said his sugar level was at 450 and that David has diabetes. It is the first time we have heard this. No wonder he has been feeling so bad. The doctor made us go to Quest immediately for another blood draw and then told us to go home and wait for his call. We got the call at 4pm that his blood sugar is at 950! The doctor said to go to the hospital ER immediately.

We got there just after 5pm and there were a good 50 people in the waiting room. Because David's life was in danger, they took us right in. We spent four hours in three different ER rooms, getting tests, blood draws, and having insulin and four bags of IV fluids. David felt much better. They finally brought him some dinner at around 9pm, still in an ER room that he shared with three other patients. An admitting doctor told me he is admitted to the hosital but no beds are vacated and ready. We left shortly thereafter and did not arrive back on the farm until 11:15pm.

Wednesday, October 26, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

David was still in the ER this morning. They finally moved him, but to another ER room. He wants to check himself out. The cardiologist was there this morning but did not get him moved. They gave him breakfast at 9am and maybe they are moving him now because he has not answered the phone.

I hope they get him moved to his own room. We have been trying to get things done here on the farm before we go see him. We have to go to the business bank and get some other things handled on the way.

One of our best, hard-working employees gave us her two week notice today so we are shocked by that. There is no way we will ever be able to replace her.

A strawberry slip that Brendon is planting.

This is an up close of the strawberry slips with roots.

I know it is fall right now and most people associate strawberries with spring and summer, but here in the strawberry capital of Texas, now is the time to plant strawberries. We got a box of two thousand strawberry plants over the weekend so some of our team have been outside planting strawberries.

Linda is planting the strawberry slips out in our back 40. We planted a little over 1100 strawberry slips.

The brown strawberry slips will soon turn into thriving, green plants.

It is now after 10am and I still cannot get David, so surely they have moved him to a room. I hope breakfast was okay for him.

Order Online And Pick Up Here

Some of our seed packets. Choose from over 1200 seed varieties at David's Garden Seeds®.

You can now order your seeds and garlic online and pay there, then come by the Farm Store for your order. Today, we had our first "order ahead and pick up". It went very smoothly. A gentleman went online and chose the three types of seeds he wanted, paid with his card, and then drove in. Matt asked how he could help. The gentleman gave us his name and said he had placed an order for pickup. Matt got it and brought it right out to him. So if you are near our Farm Store and you don't want to come in and see all of the wonderful goodies inside, you can order ahead of time and come by to pick up. If you want garlic, it is going fast, so hurry!

We headed in for San Antonio at 12:45pm. We filled the truck up with gas and then moved on to the business bank to make a deposit. Then we got to the hospital around 2:30pm. Yes, David was still in a room in the ER. We went up, stood in a long line of sick folk, finally got a visitor badge and were allowed in only to find that his bed was empty. The good thing is it was a hospital bed, not an ER bed. They took him for an ultrasound. We waited about 30 minutes until he got back. He was fairly calm, just happy to actually have a hospital bed after lying in that awful ER bed overnight.

Of course, because he missed two doses of his cardiac medications, he went into A-Fib this morning. The nurse told me that and so I said it is because you did not give him his heart medications. I gave the list to the admitting doctor late last night.

We finally left around 4:15pm and went to get some dinner. Then on to Costco for some quick shopping.

Got home with just minutes to spare before sundown. Got the eggs and tended to all of the animals and fish. Then I watered my zinnias and my out front plants. I will have to hit my backyard plants in the morning. Hopefully, David will be fine and happy in the morning so I do not have to go through more stress like this morning when he was so unhappy. All day long, I forgot to take my pills. Now I am doing laundry. David sent me home with dirty laundry. I have already packed him another bag for tomorrow.

I feel so tired and it is only 7:49pm. Time for me to get some work done.

Good news! David has finally been moved to a real hospital room around 9pm. He will be able to relax and focus on getting better instead of hearing all of the noise that comes with sharing a room with three other roommates and their friends and family, not to mention all off the medical monitors.

Matt suggested I buy some melatonin to help with not sleeping. I bought a bottle and took one around 10:30pm tonight.

Thursday, October 27, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

Good morning. I went to sleep and woke up once in the night. At 5:55am, I heard the puppies whining so I got up to let them out. I think the melatonin worked! No interruptions except for the puppies so I am grateful.

I have paid some business bills and I am fixing to head out and unlock the place. Now is not the time to be hiring new employees. It is the wrong time of year for that. We just don't have the sales right now. Why not? Duh. It is the end of October. Most people who garden will only plant in the early spring. So many new people in Texas do not realize that you can pretty much garden year round here. The garden season for most people does not start until March.

If you want tomatoes in Texas, you need to start those indoors under grow lights or in a heated greenhouse in January. Don't plant them outside in March and expect to get spring tomatoes because it can get way too hot way too fast for tomatoes to develop in Texas like it did in the spring of 2022.

This is the view from the tenth floor of the parking garage at the hospital this afternoon.

David just called. He slept well last night, except for nurses poking and prodding and taking blood pressure all night long. He is eating well and not complaining. His sugar is in the 200s now. His cardiologist thinks he can go home today. Now it is up to the internist assigned to David. He has not yet talked to him about diabetic medications or diet so he will need to be educated in all of that.

Meanwhile, I will have to go grocery shopping to accommodate his new diet. He is currently having French toast with diet syrup and using a sugar substitute in his coffee and on his oatmeal and he is not complaining.

In the afternoon, he told us to come get him. We got up there. The nurse wanted us to stay until 9pm so they could give him more insulin. It was 2pm. Insulin is about $500 a vial and he needs two different ones. Who has the money for this, plus supplies? I sure don't.

The internal Medicine doctor they want him to see as his PCP will not take him. We called over there. The receptionist told David no so I took the call and she told me the same. At any rate she said we would have to go over to his office and pick up a packet. We did and she told me again he would not accept David. I told her his cardiologist is referring him to the doctor but it did not matter to her. She is a receptionist. She doesn't get to make medical decisions. She said if he took him, it would not be until November 27. He has to be seen in a week and he will be in the hospital on November 27 after surgery.

So I took the paperwork and will have to let the cardiologist battle it out with this doctor. His website does not say he is not taking new patients but it does for some of the doctors.

I am exhausted from all of that nonsense and wondering how I will pay for it all.

We let our best employee go home to train for her new job this morning. We know she has to learn a new job that her sister has been doing working from home. Her sister is taking a job working with Amazon.

One employee called in this morning and another went home sick after three hours. Then the one who quit left permanently. Our part time person left at 2:30pm like she always does. We left for the hospital at 1pm. That left our outdoor guy, who is trained on the cash register. He took care of two customers while we were gone. One was a $300 sale! Great job!

Diabetes Type II

A blood sugar level of 140 or less is considered to be normal. On Tuesday, David's blood sugar was off the charts at 950. He could have died or gone into a coma and had no idea he even had diabetes. It is so important to stop eating so much sugar. The American diet is just filled with sugar. As kids, we are given candy as a reward for things. Then we grow into obese adults who end up with diabetes. At school, instead of giving kids candy, they should be taught about what too much candy and sugar can do to you.

We live on pre-made and processed, packaged foods here in the USA. Learning about nutrition and learning how to grow your own food, as much as possible, all year long, should be taught in school and at home. Junk food here is way cheaper than good, organic foods. It should not be this way. And now, most processed foods contain GMOs that are marked bioengineered foods and people don't even realize what they are eating.

Watering the Grass Farm across the way at sunset this evening.

Plant A Winter Garden

So far this page has been about everything but how to plant a winter garden. Your best bet to plant a winter garden in a warm climate is to choose roots and get them in the ground now. Carrots, beets, turnips, radishes, parsnips, onions, and rutabagas are a nice start to plant a winter garden. The seeds will grow into delicious edible roots down in the soil, protected from frost and cold. They are all cold hearty so the occasional frost will not hurt them. Once they are growing and established, if you get a week of cold weather, your roots will be fine.

Friday, October 28, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

This is how it looked at 7am today with rain pouring down on our back porch.

Well, good morning. Happy Friday! It is trash day. I woke up at 5:30am freezing and uncovered. I covered up but never got back to sleep. I got the dogs out and fed everyone here in the house. It is now 7:10am, still dark, and thunder is roaring. Lightning is flashing, and rain is falling.

Matt just called saying he had to pull over because it is raining so hard at 7:15am. It is pouring here. So much for trying to plant a winter garden here today. I never did get to go feed the fish or chickens because it is still dark. The thunder is just rumbling along. I had no idea we would get any of this.

Matt got here safely. We have one who called in and another who has Fridays off so it is just the four of us this morning.

David has some more cardiac issues so now he is on yet another medication. It is probably due to the diabetes and stress of pricking fingers and stomach all day long.

It is 8:16am and the rain has finally stopped. It is sort of light so I can go out and see what they did in the store and get yesterday's mail.

It is now after 9am and the store is open. The pond looks good except it needs to be back washed but I am not going to get dirty today if we have to go to the hospital again.

David said someone at the hospital gave him the name of a PCP in Pleasanton so he called and got an appointment for next week. I think it will be better than having to go into San Antonio every few weeks to see a PCP. If he is good, I need a new PCP and so does Matt. Ours was in San Antonio and retired.

Well, we went to the hospital to pick up David again today. After over an hour, David told them he was walking out since they would not let him go. The doctors discharged him but the nurses would not cooperate until he said that. Then they came in and got him all situated, IV out, etc. We just got home and it is 4:50pm. We left here before noon to go get him.

So I made dinner and David tried to figure out insulin and the new blood meter. We had no good test strips on an old one that we had. You have to calibrate this, that, and the other. Very confusing. On Tuesday, we see a doctor nearby so, hopefully, he can help us with that.

The trash man came while we were gone to the hospital and when he sat the dumpster back down, he messed up our landscaping. Unbelievable. Look at this.

The Apache Disposal man moved the dumpster, forcing the logs that were spiked into the ground to move, tearing up our landscaping. In 3 years, he has never managed to do this before.

You can see the spikes came up out of the ground. I am so sick of people coming on our property and tearing things up that we have paid for. We need a new trash company.

Saturday, October 29, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

Plant a winter garden with garlic bulbs from David's Garden Seeds®.

I slept good because David was home. It got down to 53°. The store will be open for business in one hour. Will you be coming by the Farm Store today to get our fresh garlic bulbs for your garden? We are out of the soft-necked garlic but we grow hard-necked garlic each year and it grows very well. We have two varieties left out of five. Come and get your garlic bulbs or order your garlic bulbs online here and plant a winter garden. If you put the garlic cloves in the ground now, you can harvest them in July. Our garlic is already coming up!

David is feeling very well today. He had a balanced breakfast and took his meds. He got up very early to work on the business.

The TrimLight Box fell today because it was not anchored into the dry wall. The lights stopped working.

My Trim Light Edge lights are no longer working. Today at the store, the box fell down out of the dry wall because it was put up without anchors. I think the storm we had earlier in the week fried the box but I don't know why the box fell, knocking two other pictures down off the wall on the way down.

We got new pecan coffee beans in so those are now put on display for sale. We even have a new flavor, Pecan Sticky Bun Coffee! Sounds amazing.

I back washed the pond filter this afternoon. It was coming out filthy again but not for as long as a week ago. I then added some algae killer and some de-chlorinator. Then I refilled it with water. We only had a few customers today which is disappointing.

I back washed the pond filter and turned the knob which squeezes the sponges that are inside the filter and cleans them. The water is filthy.

Sunday, October 30, 2022 - Plant A Winter Garden

Today is a glorious day outside, not even 80° yet and it is already 4:15pm. Time to plant a winter garden now!

Good Sunday morning. It got down to 48° Fahrenheit this morning. It is rapidly warming up, already at 64° at 10:30am. David is feeling much better but now his leg is swollen again so we are staying home this morning. David sees a new PCP on Tuesday. Hopefully this will be a good doctor who can help him manage his diabetes. It is very confusing right now with all of the different insulins and pills they have him on.

We have a brand new sale going on right now at David's Garden Seeds®. Buy at least two packs of seeds and save 25% with code BUY2SAVE25% at checkout.

Earlier this week when we had the rainstorm, our Trimlight Edge lights went out and the panel they had screwed on the store wall fell. They screwed it into the dry wall but did not use any anchors. So now I have a panel hanging down all crooked and cannot get the lights to come on. Maybe they were struck by lightning. We did have a power failure. David will email them. Hopefully, they will come fix them and maybe get the panel to hang right using anchors in the dry wall.

David contacted TrimLight Edge and they came over this afternoon. They said the box is hot and fried, dead. They put it back up on the wall with anchors. They will be back later on in the work week to get it fixed.

Plant A Winter Garden

Plant a winter garden now with carrots, turnips, onions, parsnips, beets, radishes, rutabaga, and more.

It's not too late to plant a winter garden if you are in Texas and/or the South. Now is the time to get the last of those winter greens and roots in the garden while they still have time to grow before the first frost. You can overwinter roots and pull them up in 60 days or so. If the weather is still decent by then, you can do a second planning.

Return from Plant A Winter Garden to Our Fourth Year

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