Those Seeds From Last Week???

Hey so, like, remember in my other post I showed you those lettuce seeds I collected and then planted? 

I did, like, the briefest skim on Google about how to harvest them, and I vaguely recall there being mention of, like, "male" and "female" plants and something about pollinating them so the seeds would be viable? I dunno, man. Like I said, I skimmed. Maybe it wasn't even about lettuce seeds, maybe it was a different plant? Also, did they need to, like, dry out or something first before going in the ground? I don't know! I just ripped them out of their flower pod-things and threw 'em in little bead-storage containers. What I'm getting at is that as I was planting them, I wasn't actually sure if I'd done the process right and if these seeds actually had a chance at growing. 

My garden is in shambles right now, by the way. Honestly, I'm pretty embarrassed about it. One of my endearingly blunt friends came over and upon seeing the state of my backyard opened up his mouth and "Wow, that's sad" came out. THANKS, JEFF. 

My amateurly-collected, possibly-not-viable lettuce seeds are the only thing I've managed to plant in months and I didn't want to get my hopes up about them so I just haven't thought about them since then. 

Tig is a leash cat.

Matt and I are Those People who walk their cat around on a leash, and jog to keep up when she's making a run at a squirrel on the fence or one of those beautiful white butterflies that aren't actually butterflies but are, in fact, cabbage moths, which are the bane of my existence since they ruin my cabbages. We also sigh and shift our weight from right leg to left leg and back again while she plops down and has a sniff and chews on the grass and we wait and wait and wait for Her Highness to please, for the love of god, move on already I'm so bored.

It was on one of our daily backyard meanderings that Tig led me back to one of my neglected grow boxes and I noticed--

-ROWS OF SEEDLINGS. 

THE LETTUCE SEEDS HAD ACTUALLY SPROUTED?!?!?!?!?!??!??!

THE FUCK.

Checking the date on my last photos of them, I saw this was eight-days post-planting, and guessing by their size, I'd say they'd probably sprung up a day or so earlier. 

So, like. 

I GUESS I HAVE LETTUCE AGAIN?

This is double exciting for me because the lettuce plants that I harvested the seeds from were starters, which means Matt and I bought them from a nursery as already-developed young plants who just needed to be added to your garden. Buying starters feels like "cheating" to me, but since Tig has burst into our life and onto every flat surface in our house, nursing my own seeds indoors has become impossible, so... starters it is! 

And now, here we are a season later, and those pre-grown transplants produced their own seeds and those seeds are now a whole new crop! PLANTS ARE MAGIC.

As for that trellis on the ground, that's my latest experimental cat deterrent.  I'm thinking that there's enough space for the plants to grow, but the metal bars are close enough together that they'll impeded the full swipe of a cat paw that is trying to dig a hole in which to poop. 

This does not factor in the reality that a cat could just sit upon it simply to rest, no pre-digging needed, no problem. 

Tig has not only our entire backyard but also plenty of other places to sit in this grow box, but consistently the only place she wants to be is directly on top of the seedlings.

Sigh.

Hopefully Tig's daily tromping and sitting will help my new baby lettuces (lettuce-i?) toughen up to be strong, hardy plants that can withstand a stomp and a rump and whatever else nature throws at it. Maybe, just maybe, they'll grow big beautiful leaves for Matt and me to eat and then they'll grow more fat little flowers full of seeds and then the cycle of my backyard seed harvesting and planting will continue. 

I hope, I hope!