Attack of the monster lettuce!!!

Due to an inordinate amount of rain that has fallen on northern Alabama in the last two weeks, my lettuces and cabbages are definitely a foot across now. They went from tiny little sproutlings to Saladzillas in just a few days.

To my overwhelming surprise, everything else in the garden (with the except of the sage, leeks, and oregano) is thriving. Even the French tarragon, which I was sure would die a brown and crunchy death like the other two herbs, has taken over the rest of the planter box where the sage and oregano used to be. And my strawberries have blossoms! The onions are so big their tops have fallen over (will that hurt them? *makes note to research*) and the broccoli/brussels sprouts are HUGE.

I think a lot of this sudden growth spurt is due to the fact that when it heats up here, no amount of bathtub watering-can trudging gets the plants as wet as they'd like. Nothing really does it except for a good deep Southern drenching. And the plants give back what they get.

Luckily for me, late March/early April is officially monsoon season in Alabama, so we have been getting a LOT of rain. Also many tornadoes and lots of thunder.

I am still torn on what I am going to do with my plants when I move here in a month or so. The lettuces will probably be made into a big final goodbye salad; I'll also harvest the onions. The tarragon can come with me, because it's in a planter, as can the strawberries. But the cabbage, the brussels sprouts, the broccoli...none of that stuff is ready for harvest, and probably won't be by the time I leave. So I think what I'm going to do is just leave them in place and see if the next owners take care of them...