I just ordered some asparagus seeds. I know it’ll take several year to get a crop, but I can be patient. I’ve waited years already! When asparagus was King in my neck of the woods, it was easy to get crowns at the local seed store. Now there’s no local seed store!
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Someone weeded my asparagus the year after I planted seeds. LOL. I planted crowns last year. I have a perennial section in my garden now.
….
In case anyone wants to buy American seeds online, I really liked the seeds I bought from Baker Rare Seeds.
In Canada, I order from Veseys on PEI and West Coast Seeds. I also buy West Coast Seeds at local garden shops. The website has more sales.
My go-to as well, also Fedco Seeds.
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Baker Creek Rare Seeds is where I bought the asparagus seeds! Also ordered some purple okra. They seem to taste the same as regular okra, but they’re such a cool color. We had grew them a few years ago and harvested seeds, but Mrs. ricepad was such a purple okra evangelist that it turns out she gave away all the seeds we’d saved!
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Someone “weeded” my fall seeded sweet peas one spring.
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I have no room to be critical. I’m usually “someone”.
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so annoying!
Ill also throw out Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (southernexposure.com). They are set up for folks in warmer climes, but they carry a fair amount of cooler-climate varieties as well. They also specialize in heirloom and non-GMO varieties, and have lots of advice about seed saving
Also Tomato Growers Supply, based here in Florida. They carry a lot more than tomatoes, and also carry a lot of heirloom varieties.
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Not food related, but: I took a lap around the main local-chain garden center this afternoon, and could not BELIEVE the prices for annual flowers. A simple 10" hanging basket of calibrachoa in a decorative plastic pot (a tiny bit fancier than a planter’s pot) was FIFTY NINE NINETY NINE.
I almost had a heart attack.
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I ran outside to check on mine!
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After major planning late last year to put together a whole amazing indoor setup, then dragging my feet all January and February, followed by a very busy March … I’m weeks late and set up on the floor, but proud to present my very first “garden” pic of the season. 
Two varieties of cucumbers and some Calabrian peppers 
… and a future promise of income to the local garden center because I’m clearly buying most of my plants again this year. Sigh.
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I got my beds composted in zone 7a this weekend. Wasn’t planning to plant anything just yet, but Lowe’s had nice looking Cherokee Purple tomato starts when I went to get mulch, so I grabbed a few and stuck them in the ground to get an early start. I’ll be looking for other heirlooms in the coming weeks - most of the garden centers around here don’t stock up on tomatoes until mid April at the earliest. I need peppers, too. Undecided on what else to grow this year, however. Snap peas? Carrots? Inspire me, HOs!
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After about a month of too hot and dry, we are having the weather we usually have in April, which means we are running out of time for peas, (and I have only harvested a handful), and it will soon be time to get tomatoes and peppers in the ground. Both come suddenly here.
I am not familiar with 7A, but I have to assume it’s a shorter, cooler season than mine! I don’t have specific advice other than two notes to myself
-
Don’t grow more than will be a pleasure to care for, or at least not a curse.
-
Plant what I like to eat but is hard to find or better within a short time after harvest.
New for me this year will be eggplant and okra, defying note number 1.
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Zone 8b here (PNW).
Our strawberries were starting to bud in the cold frame, so we moved them out to their summer growing platform. We call it a “floating garden”.
Also, first kale pick of the season today. Spinach will be next in the coming few days. Yay for leafy greens!
Finally, a gratuitous photo of some bluebells, ‘cuz they’re purdy.
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those completely-covered boxes are DROOL WORTHY, I love them.
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Oops! Okra and eggplant defy rule 2, as both are a no-go for the hubs.
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Okra are such a pretty plant and are low maintenance. I would grow some even if my hubs wouldn’t touch them (if I had a hubs). 
(maybe one of several reasons I’m single LOL)
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Thank you! It was DH’s idea (he’s the strawberry guy). This way they get full sun during the peak months, are protected from birds, and nobody has to be hunched over to harvest.
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so the strawberries stay in the pots & never planted in-ground?
That’s correct. The spend winter in a cold frame, and come out in the spring. To keep them healthy, every other year (in late winter/very early spring) the plants get lifted out of the pots and have their root-balls trimmed to offer growing space, and are then returned to the pots.
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