FREEZE FRAME!

Okay, actually today we're talking about cold frames, but the name always makes me think of that 80s song "Freeze Frame," of which I know only the shouting of "freeze frame" at the beginning. But I looked it up and found it was performed by the J. Geils Band, and the video is, but of course, on YouTube. Awesome.

BUT ANYWAY.

Onto the cold frame.

So here is the cold frame that I totally wrecked last fall by placing it underneath one of the black walnut trees to get smashed all to shit by falling walnuts. Because I am way smart. I finally got some new panes of glass cut and A. put them in on Sunday.

All better.

See, the sun comes in through the glass and warms up the box, like a mini-greenhouse. The most important thing to remember about cold frames is that they can quickly get way too warm for your seedlings. Like, even when it's 55 degrees with a cold breeze. That sun can heat them up so fast that by 2 p.m., two eggplant seedlings and all the red cabbage seedlings will have just wilted and fallen over, possibly never to rise again.

NOT THAT I WOULD DO THAT.

Except I totally did. Dammit. I swear it was NOT warm yesterday, but apparently, it was too warm in the cold frame. By the time I noticed and propped the top open with a brick to cool it down a little, I had already cooked some of the seedlings. I don't know if they'll recover.

Oh well. I'll just have to be more vigilant in the future. Anyway, the POINT is that I can now leave the seedlings out at night to harden off more. Although I did bring them in last night, because we had a frost. On May 19. We also had the woodstove going last night and this morning. Winter is being a stubborn bastard this year.

No matter! He has to give up eventually! And when he does, those seedlings are vacating the cold frame and going into the ground. Where I will hopefully manage to not kill anymore off. Amen.