Two summers ago I started 700 seedlings. (Ok, that is blatant bragging but I'm still really proud - that's a LOT of tiny little plants. And yes, maybe I did need a real life that spring.) Last year, though, I didn't start ANY, because I was homeschooling my oldest son. I thought we'd do a really cool unit on plant propagation but he wouldn't have any part of it. (He did nice baseball and solar system projects instead (I include that just in case anyone from his school is reading.)) Fortunately he's enjoying school more this year (thank you Mrs. Puia, you are my hero) so I'll start sowing the really early seedlings soon like violas and geraniums.
My biggest secret to success with seedlings is to hang fluorescent bulbs directly over the tiny plants. It's ok if they even touch. And leave the lights on 24 hours a day. I know this isn't what you've probably read but I've done it for years and the plants were really happy. And I am too because whenever I turned the lights off I usually forgot to turn them back on again. Not helpful. A little fertilizer once in a while is nice too. Dilute it a lot. And if you are an organic gardener and you use fish fertilizer, and you use it indoors, and your husband notices the smell but it's clearly too late to do anything about it, just pretend you don't smell it and change the subject. Forever. Because that's how long the smell will stick around.
If you're under a lot of snow when you read this, good news because snow is a natural fertilizer. It picks up nitrogen in the atmosphere when it falls. Very nice.
Ok, back to sewing. Have a great day.
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