It would do me well to heed some of these wise age-old sayings:

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite. Or waiting around for Friday night or waiting perhaps for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil or a better break or a string of pearls or a pair of pants or a wig with curls or another chance. Everyone is just waiting. ~Dr. Seuss

Don’t be fooled by the calendar. There are only as many days in the year as you make use of. ~Charles Richards

Enjoy yourself. It’s later than you think. ~Chinese Proverb

Simply put, why wait for spring.  Do it NOW.  My now should have been in the fall, after harvesting and putting the garden to sleep.  I should have/could have made notes about what worked, what didn’t.  But I DIDN’T.  I’m relying on my faulty memory now to recall.  How did my garden grow?  No use crying over spilt milk.  Let me move on as best as I.  I am going to make my seed list today.

What worked for sure were the potatoes.  They were big and plentiful, lasting us into January.  The carrots did well, too.  We still have quite a few and storing fairly well in a cooler in our insulated garage.  They might do better in a cold storage area in the house next year.  My tomatoes have always done well.  No need to change anything except plant fewer and less dense in the beds.  They started out small and far apart. They grew and grew and became an almost Little Shop of Horrors.

The beans and broccoli did astoundingly well.  They produced well into the frost season.  However the cabbage was not as successful as I had hoped but I will try again.  You win some.  You lose sum.  I’ve never had much luck with peas, getting a few pods at a picking.  I might plant more snow peas this year for the pods and leaves – double the return.  They’re both easy to stir fry. Snow pea tips are very flavourful and a pricey dish in a restaurant.

What else did well?  Let me see now.  The kohlrabi, chilli peppers, lettuce, kale, onions, cucumbers, squash…

What didn’t do well?  Beets were small.  Spinach too small and bolted.  Maybe too crowded and needed to be thinned aggressively.  Radishes were not as good as the year before.  We forgot to harvest frequently.  They got old and wooden.

This recalling from memory is labour intensive!  I will have to give it a rest and dig out my seed order from last year.  It would be best if I can learn from this exercise to keep notes of things as they progress – like a garden journal.  You know what they say about a stitch in time.  I know how I am – slow to learn. Ah, but I am doing the best I can.