Good morning!

I hope that you are finding creative ways to stay cool this week. The first week of triple-digit heat always makes me feel icky and off. I'm staying busy indoors with baking bread for tomato sandwiches and finding creative uses for the figs that are now starting to ripen on my tree.

Here are 5 suggestions for what you can do this weekend in the garden:

1. Begin sowing sunflowers and zinnias in succession. Through mid-August, you can plant zinnia and sunflowers seeds in succession (I'm planting my ProCut sunflowers every 7 days) to fill your home with cut flowers when most things have stopped blooming.
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2. Sow okra, pumpkins, winter squash, and melons now. I'm starting to pull out my spring tomatoes that are badly diseased or not fruiting at all, and I will be replacing them with pumpkins and winter squash. If you want pumpkins for Halloween or Thanksgiving, you have to start now.
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3. Order cold-hardy annual flower seeds so you're ready for August starting. If you want a spring garden full of poppies, foxglove, delphiniums, snapdragons or sweet peas, you need to start sowing seeds indoors in August (or you can direct sow late September through mid-October). I will be teaching this incredible method in detail for my Blossom Brilliance class in August, but it's best to start planning now.
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4. Order fall vegetable seeds. Cauliflower and broccoli need to be started indoors in late July for a fall harvest, so order seeds now before they sell out. Some of my favorite fall veggies are Cauliflower 'Snow Crown', Cucumbers 'Homemade Pickles', Kubocha Squash 'Winter Sweet', and any Salanova variety of lettuce or Botanical Interests 'Marvel of Four Seasons' lettuce.
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5. Register for "Best Ever Fall Vegetable Garden". This is by far my most popular class, and for good reason! The fall growing season here in North Texas will produce some of your largest harvests of the year. I'll review the best varieties for our area as well as how to care for fall seedlings through the heat. (Don't forget. For a limited time, you can save BIG on membership which includes this class, all future live classes, and gives you access to the entire class library plus twice monthly Office Hours for live help from me.)

​2024 North Texas Garden Planner - FINAL CLEARANCE ​
There are still six months left in the year, and the planner will always be a timeless reference tool that you can use indefinitely. Don't miss out on this chance to grab a few copies for friends and neighbors. (It's a really nice way to welcome new neighbords or new co-workers to the area.)