I woke up today to find my first sprouts since I seeded during our hiccup of rain last week.

It never ceases to amaze me. You know, when nature works.

Those trusty carrots

Let there be radishes!

Arugula sprouts

What’s perhaps even more amazing is my pre-garden store plan of attack. I’m a sucker for the garden store and going to one fills me with hope at all the prospects for my plot and future vegetable-ful life. Well, as you might remember, money is extremely tight these days; I can’t afford to be too filled with hope.

As it was unwise to set myself loose amongst a throng of seedlings without doing some homework first, I sat down at the table, took inventory of my seeds, my Central Texas growing calendar, my finances. And voila, a to-buy list emerged.

$23 spent (an all-time low for new-season starts acquisition) which even includes a couple impulse buys (rhubarb and lavender).

Each year a get a little bit better at this. Even if my on-paper plan doesn’t explode onto my kitchen table more produce than we can ever consume (as hoped), I’m learning things, happy with the pursuit more than just the product.

What’s growing this fall at my house:

• 3 kinds of carrots
• lettuce mix
• arugula
• 2 varieties of mustard greens
• 2 varieties of cabbage
• dill
• chioggia beets
• 2 varieties of beans
• broccoli
• tatsoi
• flowers (seeds planted): zinnias and bluebonnets, existing champions of drought: salvia and purslane/portulaca varieties
• basil
• parsley
• cilantro
• sage
• mint
• lavender