Project Sunshine - Day 0

Inspired by the blooms at the Sentosa Flower Festival earlier this year, I've decided to start my own. Of course, it is a smaller scale one. Made a few searches on the internet and found it was relatively easy to grow sunflowers. So here I am, chronicling the growth of my sunflowers... Ok, so they are still seeds right now, but you'll see. (I hope...)

The preparation

So here there I have a penknife, changkol, sunflower seeds (regular and dwarf varieties), seed & potting mix, organic fertilizer and plastic tray with drainage holes.

I start off by creating a nursery bed for the seeds by putting the potting soil in the tray, spreading out the soil evenly with my hands. The soil is loose and not tightly compressed into the tray.

With my fingers, I make holes in the soil approximately 2 cm deep, and 4 cm apart from each other. 3 seeds are placed into each hole and loosely covered with soil.

Apparently, I am supposed to choose the strongest seedlings from each of the group of 3 seeds after 1 week for transplanting. Even in gardening, there is natural selection.

Being kiasu, I decided to mark out a little plot of land I will later transplant my sunflower seedlings to...

Water was then poured over the soil.

The Weather

It wasn't the best state of weather today. The sky was overcast with clouds most of the day. Sunshine was only available very briefly and I put the tray under direct sunlight only to realize that it started to rain again.

I didn't want the seeds to "drown", so I heeded my father's advice and placed the tray right outside my door.

Then I went out.

That was Project Sunshine - Day 0.