It has finally decided to be winter. The ground outside is snow-covered, the temperature has dipped into the negatives, and with added wind chill today and tomorrow I am going to want to spend my time inside next to our cozy wood stove. But despite the chill, the promise of spring has already entered our household.
The seed catalogues have arrived!
If you are not a gardener, then the arrival of a spring catalogue in January may be nothing more than junk mail to you, and perhaps laughable in its early arrival (which is what I did when the Spring/Summer Sears catalogue arrived at our doorstep before Christmas!)
But to me, the arrival of the seed catalogues marks the beginning of a new planting season. And in my mind, one of the best parts (because there is no actual work to be done yet, just dreaming!) 
And so, I will cuddle by the wood stove, and contemplate what delights will grow in our garden this year. Will it be a new type of yellow beet? Will we brave the green caterpillars and try cabbage again? Oh the possibilities that good earth and a few seeds will provide!
Was that the scent of spring in the air?
What’s your favourite thing (or things) to grow? I love having zucchini and green or yellow bean in the garden. I’ve never been happy with the lettuce, though. I generally plant it, watch it grow, later realize its already going to seed (and now bitter!) and then toss it in the compost (I seriously to this every year)!
Oh…that’s a hard question. Carrots are definitely way up there on the list, because of the long harvest time (I’m still harvesting carrots after the first snow fall.) Peas are another favourite, although they almost never make it to the table, I usually eat them as a snack right out of the pods as I tend to the garden! Zucchini and cucumbers and tomatoes would definitley be next in line. I seem to do with spinach and arugula what you do with lettuce! In the summer we have salads almost every day so I never worry about the lettuce going to seed. But as I am the only one that will eat the arugula and spinach, it tends to get forgotten!