We are busy preparing for Herb Day today! Come on out to the Extension office from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. to learn about growing and cooking with herbs. The Kansas Grown! Farmers’ Market will be in the parking lot until noon, and there will be lots of opportunities to buy your herb plants for the year. For more information, check out the event flyer.

We got our shipment from Richters Herbs yesterday of a few herbs that I haven’t seen around here before. This is the Nutmeg Thyme. I was surprised how tiny the leaves are! Maybe once it is planted and gets more sun it will get a little bigger. I didn’t remember the leaves being this tiny though. We also got Rose Petal thyme, Mint thyme, Ginger mint, and Sweet Aztec. Sweet Aztec is in the mint family and has super sweet leaves, kind of like stevia.

I was all set to bring the tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant inside for the last couple of days, but then one of the Master Gardeners pointed out that we could use the cold frame. I’m still not used to having the cold frame here! We tucked everything inside and closed the lid, and it’s all looking great this morning after being out there for the past couple of days. We probably could have left it closed a little longer, but we wanted to get it open before the sun hit it and started cooking things inside.

The perennial herb garden is really looking spectacular! A couple months ago, we were sure most everything had croaked. Now it is looking great. The oregano and sage are looking particularly nice.

The ‘Red Beard’ onion is now flowering. It is really past time to pull them out, but I wanted to leave them in just until they bloomed so that I could get some pictures. The flowers are not as nicely ornamental as chive flowers. Now to get them pulled out before they go to seed! We need the spot for tomatoes anyway.

The sugar snap peas in the container by the Kids’ Snack Garden are growing like crazy and paying no attention to the weather. They kind of need something to climb on, but then again, they seem to be doing fine just climbing on each other.

Have a great weekend! Next week is going to be busy with planting (finally!).