Homestead Update: The Great Indoor Jungle (Seed Starting & Repotting!)

It’s that time of year again here in Maryland! If Rebecca had her way, our seed trays would be filled with soil by January 1st, but I always make her wait until mid-February so we don’t end up with massive, leggy plants before the last frost. We officially started our seeds about a month ago, and let me tell you, our small house has officially transformed into a glowing indoor jungle.

Literally every room with a spare square foot of space currently has a folding table or shelving system set up, complete with heat mats and bright purple grow lights. We are constantly bumping into trays, but we wouldn’t have it any other way!

The Heirloom Tomato Operation

Rebecca has been managing a massive nursery of her own. This year, she started over 200+ heirloom tomato plants spanning several different varieties!

The best part? Every single one of these was grown from seeds we intentionally saved from our best producers last season. (If you want to see exactly how we process and save them, you can read our step-by-step Post Here!) Right now, she is knee-deep in potting soil, carefully repotting all 200 of those tiny seedlings from their starter trays into individual cups to give their root systems room to stretch out before their next big move.

And lets not forget about the peppers! I don’t know about you, but our peppers always seem to take a long time to grow, so we started 12 different hot pepper varieties to give them a jump start on the season.

Expanding the Homestead Apothecary

While Rebecca tackles the tomatoes, I have been busy starting several new plants to expand the Grow, Gather, Heal medicinal herb gardens.

This year, we are introducing some incredible new chemistry to the yard. We planted Scarlet Bee Balm, Elecampane, and both Common and Rose Mallow, which are absolute heavy-hitters for deep respiratory health and providing soothing mucilage for inflamed tissues. We also added Meadowsweet (a potent natural source of salicylates for pain relief), Arnica for our topical trauma salves, and Passionflower as a powerful nervine to help calm the nervous system and promote sleep. Throw in some Agrimony and Joe Pye Weed, and the apothecary is going to be incredibly well-stocked!

We also started flats of herbs we already grow but wanted to expand into much larger patches, including our old favorites: Stinging Nettle, Borage, and Hyssop.

Waiting on the Weather

Having hundreds of plants inside takes up a massive amount of space, and we constantly have to remind each other to keep up with the daily watering schedule under those hot grow lights. But honestly? We have so much fun just drinking our coffee and watching the green shoots get taller every day. Now, we are just keeping our fingers crossed for the Maryland temperatures to normalize and warm up enough so we can finally move these babies outside into the dirt!