We just finished eating dinner, and now we are going to work some more on our seed order. It will take another week or so to complete the order. We buy our seeds and soil media from several vendors, and preparing the seed order is one of the jobs that must be done in winter. The hardest part is trying to estimate how much seed is needed. Since we grow 10's of different crops in varying quantities, calculating seed planting or transplanting densities can be a chore. Winter is the best time to create our seed order because we can usually get the best prices on seeds and we can find alternate sources if one vendor is out of some critical seed variety.

For home gardeners, winter garden preparation is also a good idea. Planning the spring garden can lift one's spirits in the relatively non-eventful month of January. My favorite part is drawing out the gardens and deciding where I will plant everything. Stephen Covey says that all things are created twice—the first is always the design or plan. When I draw out the gardens and fields, I can begin to visualize the location of each crop, and I am free to move crops around at will in ways that I won't be able to do once we start planting. Most importantly, by seeing the fields in my mind's eye in January, I am able to hurry spring along,if only in my heart.