In celebration of spring and Mother's Day just around the corner, we've made some fresh collection to share with the people who love us best and grow us most :)

Each of our collections includes six easy-to-grow packets, plus growing instructions.

And Friends! Enjoy 

free shipping 

 on any order including at least one collection through May 10th with promo code

yayformay

Here are a few of our favorites:

  edible flower collection  

Our easiest flowers to grow, becoming a glorious spectrum of color for garnishing salads and cakes as well as bouquets, our edible flower collection includes annuals as well as perennials for you and your pollinators!

  culinary herb collection  

Here are the herbs growing just outside our door, easy to grow and abundant all season long. Our culinary herb collection thrives in both gardens and containers.

  pollinator collection

Our pollinator collection is easy...

The warblers are returning and peepers peeping, daffodils bright gold and Friends, we're getting closer every day to SUMMER! In the meantime, a glorious spring is unfurling around us. Here are the easiest seeds we're sowing now to surround us with abundant blooms this season, plus a few keys to keep in mind.

Before We Begin

As you start seeds this season:

~ sow only seeds 2 to 3 times their depth (ie, not very much) and read the packet instructions, since some flowers actually need light to germinate.

~ sow only 2 to 3 seeds per cell and thin to the strongest single one as quick as you can.

~ bottom-water whenever possible and allow the soil surface to dry, ever so slightly, between overhead waterings.

If you haven't already seen it, we made a seed starting infographic for you here! And for detailed step-by-step instructions for starting seeds, check out Rise & Shine: Starting Seeds with Ease, my ebook. Also, Fruition's Seed Starting Academy has hours of...

As robins flock, days warm and daffodils rise, our psyches itch sow seeds. That first delicious day in the 60s sends the shoes off my feet as I scramble to plant peas, spinach cilantro and those first, sweet radishes of the season. Truly, there are few finer feelings.

So Friends, I'm excited to share what I'm sowing directly in the ground ~6 weeks before final frost here in the Finger Lakes, Zone 5!

But first, two things about soil temperature and texture, everyone's favorite subject:

Before You Sow Seeds in the Soil This Spring...

...let's talk texture

If your soil is soupy, even a little, your seeds will likely rot. We typically direct sow and transplant into our raised beds and containers, which warm up and drain much more quickly than the garden soil, between two or three weeks before we plant into our gardens. Even light tillage of wet soils will compact and destroy your soil texture, sometimes taking years to recover. 

How do you know if your soil is...

In our gardens and in our lives, timing is everything.

And Friends, it is so easy to start seeds way too early. 

My dear friend Sal and I created a planting calendar for you to help nail your timing this season!

It's counter-intuitive, but plants started too early often get stressed (too little light, too few nutrients) and thus produce later and less abundantly than younger plants that are less stressed.

So hold your horses, dear Friends!

And here is our calendar for Zones 4 through 6 to keep you on track:

Each online order this season will receive one of our planting calendars, as well :)

You'll find a ton of information on this chart and each of our packets are mini-encyclopedias of information, as well. In addition to longer growing instructions, there is a quick reference tab with some pretty handy advice to have at arm's length. You'll find plant spacing after thinning, whether to direct sow or transplant (or both), days to germination, when to sow and seeding...

Each winter we take to the road, tens of thousands of seeds in tow, to celebrate the turning of the seasons and see the bright faces of countless people we love at flower shows all across the Northeast.

We've met so many of you at these shows and without question, you are why we keep packing our bags each February, despite the snow and the cold :)

Thanks for coming in from the cold to warm our souls and talk gardens, seeds and spring!

Here is where you'll find us, Friends:

Hartford Flower Show 

You'll find us here Thursday, February 21st through 4th

Presentations on Stage:

Thursday at 2 pm: 10 Keys for Container Gardening

Sunday at 11 am: 5 Keys to Preventing Tomato Disease

Presentations in Booth:

Every half hour: Using soil blockers & making seed balls 

We're bringing five new dinner plate dahlia tubers for you...!

Philadelphia Flower Show

You'll find us here Friday, March 1st through 10th

Presentations on Stage:

Saturday at 4:30: 10 Easy Flowers to Grow in...

Join Our Grow Your Own Ginger Webinar

Join us Thursday, March 21st at 6:30! I'll be sharing the keys you need to successfully sprout your ginger and set yourself up for growing gorgeous abundance this season, from beginning to end. 

Register here to reserve your seat!

Yes, You Can Grow Your Own Ginger!

Friends, we're constantly experimenting, pushing the envelope of what can be grown here in our short seasons. Peanuts? With the right seeds, easy. Sesame. Super easy. Chia? A remarkable plant, though (sigh) she will never flower for us here, our days are too long.

We're ecstatic to announce we've added ginger to the lengthy list of unexpected plants you can grow in the Northeast, even in a container, right in your backyard!

Why We Love Baby Ginger

Fresh, baby ginger is sweet yet savory, lusciously melting in your mouth and nearly fiber-free, entirely unlike the mature ginger shipped thousands of miles, what most of us have known as ginger our whole lives....

Friends! Country Gardens featured Fruition in their latest issue and it is gorgeous!

What I really want to share, though, is something my Mother taught me: You never know who you’re talking to, so be nice and be generous. Enjoy our video for the full story :)

And Friends, please do read the article, and the photographs are stunning, but my deepest wish is that we all might be a little more kind and a little more generous with our brief time together...

...and that we all might know that planting seeds is the most radical act of kindness and generosity there is. 

Here are some photos of the full article:

Fruition's Donation Seed 

And Friends, did you know we donate thousands of packets each year to civic-minded organizations we love? We love to send you seed! Here's how it works: We send 50 packets of assorted packets to extraordinary organizations; simply send us $10 to cover our shipping and handling and we'll tuck them in the mail. Once it's...

Has it really been seven years?!!!

Happy Coming to Fruition Day, Friends!

It was this day, seven years ago, that Fruition truly came to Fruition. One month earlier, Matthew and I had signed our LLC papers, but this was the moment. It's a pretty funny story, with the gentle resilience of retrospect, though I definitely cried and woah was it existential at the time. I share the full story below!

And Friends, the ironic part for me today is that I'm feeling the jitters of, 'can we do this?' and 'is this what the world needs?' Doing something you've never done before is both terrifying and thrilling and boy, do Matthew and I have droves of such experiences :)

I've been working hard on an exciting new project and I'm thrilled to finally share the details with you! Chelsea and I made more than 500 videos in 2018 and I've made four online courses for you, with more in the wings. I hope you'll join me! They're available for a limited time, so reserve your seat today :)

...

I fondly recall long winter evenings by the fireside, pouring tea and steeping with seed catalogs, dreaming about the season ahead. I wish I could go back to the couch and snuggle up with my seven-year-old self and ask her some questions. I'm especially curious what that little girl thought an "F1 tomato" was or how she would describe the significance of an 'heirloom' variety. How would my seven-year-old self define 'organic?'

Fast-forward: Here is how I describe both terms things now, plus a few others, like the 'GMOs,' that were just being invented when I was born in 1983. So put on the kettle, snuggle up (with your seven-year-old, if you've got one) and let's dream about the abundance ahead for this and for all generations to come.

First, I'll define some key terms for you, with succinct sweetness as my goal, adding their advantages and disadvantages, each from my perspective as a small-scale, organic seed grower.

Then I'll share my story of the history, both ancient,...

First, a soon-to-be not-so-secret for you!

I'm in the marvelous midst of creating Fruition's first online courses, YAY!!! This post is just a fraction of what I'll be sharing to set you up for success in our Container Gardening Mini-Course. If you'd like to be first in line when our courses open in February, let me know and when they're ready I'll send you an invitation with a special thank you :) 

Without further ado!

Friends, sowing well-adapted varieties makes organic gardening SO much easier.

In any size garden, on any scale farm.

Container gardens, especially. 

What makes a variety well-suited for container gardening?

Two main factors:

How much space does this variety take up? Some varieties are more compact than others, making them more optimal for container gardening.

Will this variety thrive with less than optimal nutrients and less even watering? Both are realities of most container gardens, so starting with resilient seeds makes all the difference.

I...