scholarly ghost check in
greenhouse update
The steady clip I’ve been sustaining all semester is temporarily halting just long enough for me to hop off and tend to my taxes. While the window is open: I’m checking in with you! Thin veil energy and I’m a scholarly ghost suddenly visible during tax season between midterms and finals.
Today’s newsletter table of contents:
A Greenhouse Update with a sprout report & spreadsheet
The reason I’ve been absent from this space: chemistry & bio classes
Home renovation progress: making a bathroom where no bathroom was before
Random trail race tale (in which I lose to a chemistry professor)
A local herb symposium I am attending :)
My semester ends in approximately one month and I’m taking the first half of my summer to tend to garden projects, make suntrap magic, do a major kitchen renovation, go on some adventures, and WRITE. As much as I love school (& I am about to fill you in on that) I’m looking forward to spending my days outside with my hands in the soil again.
Before we move on can I fill you in on what it’s like being in school? Let me put it like this, at night when I can’t sleep because I’m feeling stressed about the world, I soothe myself into a happy, sleepy state by visualizing subatomic particles. I mentally walk through molarity equations and review the rules of the periodic table. Real Beautiful Mind hours except it’s Chem I and I’m not cracking any codes - just tapping into a well of passion that’s been latent in me all this time. I come home from six hour chemistry labs beaming and Hayden is ready for me like, “Okay, tell me all about it.” He remembers everything from his days in chemistry classes and can keep up with whatever stoichiometry I’m rambling on about.
Relevant to this space: my chemistry professor has agreed to look over my plans for making an indigo vat with all the fresh indigo I’ll be growing this year. I’m excited to get his two cents in making the most vibrant blue vat I possibly can. Also looking forward to distilling this summer with a deeper understanding of the compounds I’m extracting.
In another realm of school: I’m doing a literature review on the current status of the American Beech Tree (Fagus grandifolia). I’ve been scouring all of the latest research on Beech Leaf Disease and Beech Bark Disease and reading papers on what it will mean for the composition of our northern forests. I’m paying special attention to the relationship between beech trees and Black Bears (Ursus Americanus) and what a forest recomposition would mean for them. I’ll share my conclusions here when I’m done!
I’m also in a math class and we’re doing things like synthetic division and I don’t really have much to say about it except that my professor is really kind and I’m fighting for my life to come out unscathed with an A.
GREENHOUSE REPORT
This is what we live for, this is what we like!!! Here is a link to a copy of my seeding spreadsheet. This includes everything I’m growing this season with seeding timelines. The shaded green cells are plants I have already seeded. I found the template online and customized it a bit. Feel free to make a copy of it and edit to your heart’s content.
Sprouted Seedlings:
Organized by Herbs, Dye plants & flowers, & Vegetables
These are the little plants already popping up in the greenhouse :)
Chamomile
Elecampane
Marshmallow
Sage
Catnip
Lavender
Dyer’s Coreopsis
Japanese Indigo
Larkspur, “Earl Grey”
Hollyhock, Black
Snapdragon
Bachelor Button
Shallot, “Crème Brûlée”
Lettuce, “Freedom Mix”
Eggplant, “Gaudi”
Tomato “Principe Borghese” (growing these to dry in our solar dehydrator!!)
Tomato “Striped German”
Celery, “Ventura”
Pepper, “Habanada”
Next weekend is 4 weeks from our last frost date and will be my biggest seeding date. I’ll also be taking all my native plant seeds out of stratification and getting them going. I am going to have to find some more table space!!
I ran a 13k trail race last weekend. I needed to tire myself out to sit and finish reading the beech tree source papers I mentioned earlier. So I hopped in the car with a few new friends (that I made in my strength training class at the Y, flex) and we drove to Mt. Toby to run up a small mountain in the misty cold. While I was running, there was one couple in particular who I felt like I was racing - we kept passing each other every couple miles. With about 2 miles to go, they passed me again and I sped up to try to keep pace with them - unfortunately in that moment they veered off course and I followed them for a good quarter mile or so before I realized what we had done. I yelled to them a few times and eventually got their attention - they agreed we had made a mistake. In turning back I had the lead for the next mile or so until they overtook me just before the finish line. When I was looking at the race results later, I searched the woman’s name because I’m always curious who I’m keeping pace with- turns out she’s the chemistry teacher at a nearby college! I’m thinking of reaching out…
Bathroom Brief
With the help of a contractor, we turned a small bedroom on our second floor into a large bathroom. I call it the spa and love to take a bath and then roll out my yoga mat on the wood floor with my muscles feeling warm and relaxed. The afternoon light in the room is insane. This alcove is the tub zone and here I am running a bath for the first time before I even took the window stickers off. Towels hastily strewn on the floor in anticipation. We are still dialing in the details of this room but it is coming along. I painted the walls and trim over spring break.
Western Mass Herbal Symposium
This is happening May 17th, the Saturday after I finish my last exam! And it is happening where I live, in Montague Massachusetts. Herb besties - are you going to this? Let me know! I already have all the classes I’m attending picked out ~:-)
Signing off with some of my favorite chemistry charts. If you are also a chem head, let’s talk!
Love,
Geraldine
P.S. if you have made it this far, go ahead and make my day - click that freaky little heart thing.
You've been BUSY! So nice to hear about all the ways you're settling into your new home :)