lighting and such

I've been trying to get Sophie to switch her lamp on and off everyday, but its been very sporadic, up until last week, when her brain clicked and now she is super consistent!...and the plants are happy she did!...you'll see there's been quite a bit of growth.

We followed the instructions on the seed pack and plucked the weaker looking plants out. I thought she'd be unhappy at removing 'her' plants, but surprisingly she loved to pull them out...
Since the instructions say that it takes a few months for the flowers to grow i'm being very patient...certainly -for me anyway- not as rewarding as growing basil and other herbs.

a new batch of basil

i've been travelling a lot lately again!..sorry for the tardiness.

as we move into the holidays i thought i'd replant in preparas new power plant pro.
of course my dream is to have freshly grown basil all the time to hand, and in this dark, chilly, wet november climate the indoor power plant really delivers...if you're also stuck in a dark spot- don't forget to get the grow lamp too! (my current hot tip is to buy from brookstone.com ..who carry the lamp for an amazing price- that won't be repeated after that batch sells through!...and the lamp is made to fit both the pro and the mini, also can be used for propagating your other seeds come springtime)

i loaded the power plant pro with sweet italian basil from burpee, you can see the sprouts are doing well and i expect to start pinching them back early next week.
the seeds only cost me a couple of bucks and there's hundreds!!!...no expensive system needed...i'm sure the one pack will keep me in basil for a couple of years!

hope everyone, even remotely interested in growing, gets a chance to try one of these power plants- whether its the mini or the pro....even absolute novices, which btw my daughter is 4-and definitely a novice gardener- i read her the instructions, she followed along...she is very excited to plant and see the seeds grow...and she cant believe she can eat the produce...it's very rewarding.

i'll post more images as they sprout upwards

the mini is available online-prepara.com and at target.com, cooking.com, amazon.com, bedbathandbeyond.com
the pro is just being rolled out and so far just at brookstone.com until next month