Already time for early Spring transplanting!

On January 5, I started some broccoli, cauliflower and letter for our early spring garden under my grow lights.  Within a week, the plants were already up and ready to be separated.

I was shocked at how many seeds germinated.  I think it was 100%  So I made some newspaper pots and separated them out.

I cleaned out or fall lettuce and placed as many in the tubes to grow as I can.  The rest I put into treys to water by hand. The other side of our greenhouse tubes is full of broccoli ready to harvest.

I was shocked that I think I have over 150 broccoli plants and a couple dozen cauliflower.  We love broccoli but I may have to give some plants away!  They are perking up quickly.  I also cleaned out our lettuce.  I had about 4-5 cuttings off of them.  Look at the roots they generated! Even the little broccoli plants were about 1" tall but had 3-8" roots already growing.

You can see one of our floating beds of lettuce still has some to harvest in the next week or two.  Otherwise, I have new lettuce starting.  We put water with organic nutrients in the bottom. . .

 We use a fish aquarium aerator in the water and put styrofoam on top where I set the plants in.  It is a great system!  You watch it grow and harvest!

January 4 Greenhouse harvest!

 Here's my greenhouse harvest from Saturday, January 4th!  Almost 1/4 bushel of great tasting, organically grown greenhouse tomatoes and Swiss Chard!  This fall's tomato crop is wonderful and we should have tomatoes for four more weeks!

Our broccoli in the greenhouse  is almost ready as we are finishing up the broccoli from the fall garden.  It has been tremendous!

 

Day in Orlando!

One of our days in Florida was spent in Orlando.  First we went to the Orlando temple so Grandpa and Grandma could watch the kids while the others went to the temple for a session.

 The kids really enjoyed looking at the temple and going around the grounds.

 

 We took the kids to a nearby park that had a wonderful playground. 

 

Afterwards we enjoyed lunch and since we have a lot of Lego lovers, we went to the Lego store at downtown Disney to show them the huge Lego creations!

Here is Andrew flexing his Hulk muscles and Matthew and Ethan looking mean!

 Here are the girls with their poses!

Of course they did have some huge Lego creations outside!

 and even in the water!

Florida Christmas Trip - Brevard zoo!

After Christmas, the South Carolina Harper's went to visit with Kevin and family in Florida.

The weather was cool for Florida but warmer than South Carolina and we all had a great time.

We took time to go to the Brevard Zoo, which is a beautiful place.

They have lots of exotic birds and in the bird cage, we were able to feed them a little nectar!

Even when you didn't they would land on you.  It was wonderful!

Here are some more birds:  We have a Katy bird. . .

 

an Ethan bird. . . 

 a Maggie bird. . .

 an Andrew bird . . .

 a Matthew bird. . .

 and a Sveta bird!

 It was decorated for Christmas.

 We also found some turtles!

 Here are Eric and Tracy's family at the end of the day!

All of the kids had a wonderful day!

January 2 Greenhouse Harvest

This is my harvest from our greenhouse this morning.  Our fall Greenhouse tomatoes are wonderful and a lot of fruit was set.  The greens are Swiss chard, the largest leaves from two plants.  Our greenhouse broccoli is starting to head.  What good food!