This morning I thinned my rainbow chard plants. These are the baby plants I uprooted so that the remaining plants have room to grow:



They represent my first-ever vegetable garden "harvest," so I am very excited! I walked back in to the house clutching these fresh, lovely, tender greens with a big smile on my face. I am beginning to understand why people get so enthusiastic about gardening.

Not sure how to assign a monetary value to these since you don't see "baby chardlings" at the supermarket. I decided on $1.50 after asking myself how much I would pay for them: Are they worth more than a buck? Yes, definitely! Would I pay $2 for them? Naw, probably not. So, $1.50 it is.

Full-grown chard has fairly tough stems, so normally I would chop them up and stir fry in a bit of olive oil with garlic. But, these guys are so nice and tender that I think I'll just steam them.

My grape tomato seedlings are about ready to transplant. I've been "hardening them off" ... a month ago I did not even know what that meant!

Because I have no more "$20 Challenge" funds left without "charging it" and because I'm moving in the fall and don't want any more STUFF, I'm looking for suggestions on how to make homemade, disposable tomato cages. Could I make them out of old wire hangers, or would those be too flimsy?