Starting Seeds in Egg Cartons

Spring as sprung! Well, at least it has in my neck of the woods :). Seed starting is a great way to shake those winter blues and let the sunshine know that you are ready!!! If you've been following along with this blog (and my family blog) for a few years, you'll know that we make a small 'attempt' at gardening each year, mostly unsuccessfully. But with kids and gardening, I believe it's the process that's most important. I always feel like I'm earning a few 'awesome mom points**' each time I see my kids digging in the dirt, and asking questions about life, science, food, sunshine and how it's all connected.

This year, I thought the kids were old enough and had the patience to start some plants from seeds. We used cardboard egg cartons because it was something that the kids see every day, it's cheap, and totally biodegradable. Since you can plant the egg carton, it makes it easier to transplant seedlings without disturbing the roots.

What else do you need? We also went to our nursery and picked out a few seed packets and grabbed a small bag of sterile seed starting soil.

To get started, I cut apart the egg carton bottom and top. We'll be planting in the bottom, and the top will make a good tray for catching drips and spills from watering.

Using a knife, I punched small holes in each well from the bottom.

Now it's time to put away the sharp tools, and let the kids have fun! Fill each well with the seed starting mix. (Yes, it will make a mess!)

And then put a few seeds in each well. I wish I had saved half the seeds from each packet because we planted waaay to many. It was hard to stop the kids once they got started!

And more mess :) . Cover the seeds with a light dusting of dirt, and water well.

We had good luck with putting the seeds on top of the fridge until they germinated. (Seed starting pro's use a heating mat to increase the soil temp for germination). Once they germinated, we put them in the sunniest window in our house.

Look at all those hopeful sprouts! In case you are comparing, these are tomato seedlings, and the seeds show above are squash seeds.

These pictures were taken a few weeks ago-- I'm happy to say that the squash has already started showing 'true leaves', and have been potted up. The tomatoes still look a lot like the photo above, but I have my fingers crossed! I'll keep ya'll updated!

*On 'awesome mom' points. I don't want anyone to think you have to do silly crafts with cardboard egg cartons or toilet paper rolls with your kids to earn awesome mom points. You should give yourself points each time you spend time with them, care for them, listen to them, and love them. See, you already have a perfect score :)