Test. Test. Test. Posted this twice already and it disappears after submitting.

Okay, so this time, since I didn't spend all that time typing many words, and it didn't disappear when I hit submit, so I came back to add more to the first 'test test test' line.

So, here we are, starting the fourth week of January with The January Thaw. No matter what your weather is doing today wherever you are in this state (or any other state!), the weather sure feels better than last week's low temperatures and low dewpoints.

There's Extreme fire danger out in the western counties where a Red Flag Fire Warning is in effect. There's a chance of light rain, possibly thunderstorms and even a tornado or two in SE OK and adjacent states. For those of us in the middle of the state along the I-35 corridor, we're sort of stuck in the middle, with somewhat lower fire danger but also no danger of tornadoes or severe thunderstorms. I'm okay with that.

Seed-starting anyone? It is about the time. I think I'll start seeds of cool-season crops indoors under lights sometime this week, which will give me transplants ready to go out into the ground in 4-6 weeks. Maybe by the time planting time rolls around, the weather will be more settled down.

While we are enjoying The January Thaw, and balancing ourselves between the winter fire season and some early spring like showers on the other, what else can we be doing? Hmmm. Seed season is in full swing, but I think most people already have ordered theirs. Some are winter sowing.

I ordered seeds from 4 companies last week plus onions from Dixondale, which are set for delivery around mid-February. With the seeds ordered (all ordered the same day, one order after another, in a short time frame), three of the four orders have arrived. They came in this order: 1) Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, 2) Willhite Seeds and 3) Totally Tomatoes. So, the handful of seeds I ordered from Burpee will arrive in last place, and then the onions will come when they're expected because Dixondale never yet, ever, has messed up my shipping date.

Today is flower seed day since it is too windy to do the chores we had planned for outdoors, and Tim is back in bed with the flu and feeling worse today than he felt on the days he stayed home sick last week. (I told him that staying home for 2 days was not enough, but what do I know?)

Drought seems likely this Spring. The long-term outlooks indicate we're most likely to have above-average temperatures and below-average rainfall through at least the end of April. I only looked at 3 months out, so both conditions could continue on, but I didn't want to look too far ahead. Rainfall is needed really badly here if our Spring gardens are to get off to a good start. In some of the more western parts of OK, they've now gone at least 105 days with little to no meaningful rainfall. That's just awful. Here's the map that shows it:

Consecutive Days With Less than 0.25" of Rain

I cannot help thinking the western winter wheat crop will be a bust this year.

This weekend, the Atwood's and TSC closest to us (Gainesville, TX) have a little bit more in the stores to indicate Spring is just around the corner. TSC has bare-root blueberries and blackberries. Atwood's has two varieties of Dixondale Farms' onions (a red sweet onion I assume is Southern Belle and Texas 1015Y) and three varieties of certified seed potatoes---Norkotah Russett, Norland Red and Yukon Gold. All the stores now have the full complement of seed-starting merchandise, including flats, peat pellets, peat pots and sterile soil-less seed starting mixes.

What's new with you and what chores will y'all be doing this week? I plan to clean out the garden and the chicken coop, and feed the compost pile really well with all that stuff to add to it.

Dawn