Mandarin Orange Blue Macro Monday December 2, 2013

Welcome to my Monday post, today I am linking with-

Blue Monday hosted by Smiling Sally

Macro Monday 2 hosted by Gemma Wiseman

Mandarin Orange Monday hosted by Lorik

My Pelargonium Geranium that makes an excellent blooming houseplant twice a year-

I hope everyone enjoyed Thanksgiving.  We had dinner with my son's family of 5 kids on Thursday, then had dinner here for them Friday along with my daughter and 102 year old Swedish mother-in-law.

I also grew up in a family of 5 kids, so learned to be utilitarian and frugal.  So when I started keeping my daughter's 2 female Zebra Finches, and saw how many eggs they kept laying, I eventually decide to try them.  They are tiny, here with an egg from our ducks, and a chicken egg-

 One egg, poached-

They are hard to get out of the shell, I have to squeeze the halved shells between my fingers, I guess because of surface tension.  They have the most delicate exquisite egg taste you could imagine.;-P

Here is my typical brunch, I finally got around to presoaking the buckwheat overnight and a lot of foam came off in cooking, so I hope that means I got rid of a lot of phytates, which bind minerals from food and prevent absorption.   I add vegetables, here some Japanese long eggplant; the poached egg duck egg, some soft goat cheese and/ or sour cream, and season with lemon pepper and Turmeric.  Very satisfying.

I decided to start some plants earlier than usual this year, so I am growing seeds under lights, and also planted some covered in baggies in my refrigerator to stratify for a month or two.   See more about my shelves and lights here.   Here are some after 1 week, Side Oats Grama grass and Coreopsis lanceolata-

One week Side Oats Grama and Monarda 'Bergamo'-

Two week Phygelius capensis, miniscule when it sprouted at one week,  and one week Anagalis monelli-

Coreopsis lanceolata Sunburst and Sterntaler at 2 weeks-

Browallia speciosa, which took longer and had poorer germination than the Browallia americana I grew last year, and Echinacea 'Bravado' which didn't need stratification, yay! at two weeks-

I used to spray the soil and seedlings, now I use a glass dropper bottle, I water them morning and night with around 5 squirts per container to keep them moist, I don't use plastic covers like some recommendations because I had trouble with mold.  Sometimes very small seeds seem to wash so end up in clumps like Bergamo above-

In addition I have some seeds that have not sprouted, either they have poor germination or will take longer or need stratification or ?

Happy Cyber Monday!   I hope you had better luck getting Legos or ? on Black Friday than I did.

Hannah

or cameras are macro