The Schmidt Family Daffodils

If you still have your copy of the Tuesday Gazette Times, look for the article in it talking about the special "Schmidt" variety of Daffodil. My great grandfather planted these flowers around a farmhouse south of town, and my father saved some bulbs from the property before they disappeared. My father has never seen a variety like them anywhere else. There's a bit of a story about how they've been preserved all these years, and right now they're blooming under the fig tree in his front yard. It's in the "Opinion" section of the paper.

Geraniums Are Here!

Yup, another sign of spring: We have Zonal and Martha Washington Geraniums in the greenhouse. Geraniums do well in a wide temperature range, so you can plant them early in the spring and also put them in full sun in the summer where they'll bake. Our greenhouse is very pretty right now, with all the Geraniums, Pansies, Primroses, Bleeding Hearts, Ranunculus, Helleborus, Candytuft and more.

Tool Wall Is Back In Business

Tim and I had to stay until midnight on Friday to do it, but the back wall with all our tools is finally put back together. We couldn't do it during the day because we had to take everything down off the wall and spread it out on the floor to organize and see what we really have. OSHA would have had a fit. Then we had to figure out how to fit it on the wall again. Now you can find what you're looking for!

It's Shocking When You Walk In The Door

Finally, after 30 or 40 years, we moved the check stand. We decided to was blocking movement through the store by being right in front of main door. And of course the place we moved it to (the back of the store) already had something in it, and the place we moved that to already had something in it, etc.

Now that we have all the space freed up in the front of the store, and the roof all fixed up, the next project is to bring in all those pallets of merchandise sitting in the greenhouse and unpack them. And at the same time, pretty much every surface in the store that's not made of glass is getting painted - in new colors!

I think the roof is done

I think repairs are all done on the roof. Now we can finally take down the plastic sheeting inside the store and clean up! It took a little longer than expected (surprise, surprise!), but other than one "oopsie" on the last day pretty much as planned. The oopsie was that over last weekend the roofer left tarps (or roofing material?) over the last area that they hadn't completed, and it collected a pool of rainwater. When they tried to remove those tarps on Monday they fumbled, and a deluge of water came down through the ceiling into the store. I'm told it ran all the way from the south end of the store (by the Co-op) down into the greenhouse. Fortunately, all our plastic sheeting was still up inside so the water just splashed onto the floor and nothing was harmed. Dramatic, but no damage.

All the plant benches are now repainted, and have been curing in the greenhouse so the finish is nice and hard. Hopefully next week we'll be able to set plants on them again in the greenhouse. The staff is now hard at work doing more painting in the greenhouse.

There's a rumor we may do some major moving inside the main building over the weekend...

Secret Sale Preview

Psssttt... Sale coming tomorrow, but you get to start today. Officially starting tonight when we send the announcement email, Primroses will be on sale for 99 cents each (regular price $1.79 each). But if you're reading this, you can get the sale price today also. All you have to do is mention that you read about the sale on my blog, or saw it on Facebook.

New Roof On Monday!

I'm so excited I can hardly stand it! If the weather holds we're getting a new roof on Monday! No more buckets on the floor in the back of the store! Our roofer just came by with somebody from the city to get a permit for the job, so he must be serious.

Since we're actually removing the old roof down to the roof beams we can't have any rain for 4 days or it will just rain inside the store. According to the National Weather Service the weather is supposed to be spectacular all week. Cross fingers!