Bon Voyage Rafer

So dan and I bid rafer bon voyage today, and we sent him off in style, by having Pho together at super friends.
Last minute pho

rafer is off to austria, and then italy to hang out with hs family there for three weeks.

of course, being rafer, hes traveling light.
Trusty Rover is ready to go at a moments notice!
Rover

rafer is going to be blogging about his adventure as he can, at his previous website, rafer babble. check it out, http://raferbabble.blogspot.com/. plus he has an epic post about todays adventures. so go check it out, and leave a comment, he likes that! 😛 i also have his website in my list of links on the right there –>

safe travels rafer.

Tea!

so, we all like tea. i think i forgot to post about my chinese tea tray i made, ill get to that, there’s still some work to do in it. anyways, i digress.

i found some tea seeds!!
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they are huge compared to other seeds.

the scary thing is, there are 2 ways to germinate them. one is to crack them, the other is to soak them.
i tried the cracking way first!
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pretty scary stuff doing that the first time.

i got a video of me cracking them with my little vice grips.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6nKbSrLwPY4[/youtube]

they still have not germinated, but i have high hopes. the crazy thing is, i cant seem to find tea seedlings anywhere in vancouver. i think i have tried every nursery there is in the lower mainland. maybe i need to venture out further.

once sprouted, it takes 3 years to be able to harvest the tea leaves.

also, if you did not know, all tea in the world comes from one type of plant! yes, green, white, matcha, everything. the only difference is how they process the tea! pretty amazing.

More Plants

Lets see, whats happening on the gardening front. i feel like i haven’t posted anything in a while.

First off, noa is gone for a few weeks, so i took the opportunity to add a few more grow lights to give the seedlings a head start while its still frosty out.


the basil looking good
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tomato trees
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the new temporary set up
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the office
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rhea’s seedlings are doing well
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cute purple basil coming up
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look at those peppers and arugala!
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Ohh, and then i finally finished a project i was working on at the Heppler hotel.
here is the first bed i did a few weeks ago
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and here is the big one i just finished during this week! transplanted 25 garlic/onion mix (we dont know what is what for sure) and its big enough to put a lot more in it once it gets warm enough
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thats it for now, but i have one more exciting post about tea coming up!