Welcome to Day 17 of the 30 Day Challenge: How to Start a Vegetable Garden.

Over the last week or so, I've been preparing my seedlings for potting up or transplanting. Today, I decided it was time to dig in and transfer these little guys into their new homes.

While I did pot up some of my tomato seedlings today, I'm more excited about my lettuce and the journey taken to get these little seeds into their permanent homes today.

Growing Lettuce From Seed

It was approximately 6 weeks ago that I planted tiny little iceberg lettuce seeds into six 1"x1" starter pods filled with seed starting soil.

The seeds were so tiny, I couldn't imagine that an entire head of lettuce started with something so small. But, I put 3 seeds in each pod, covered them for 2 weeks and waited.

After 2 weeks or so, the skinniest of plants began to grow. Five of them to be exact.

These little seedlings grew tall, approximately 2 inches, but the stems were still so thin I was afraid they weren't going to make it.

Then, something amazing happened. The first lettuce leaves began to grow.

Over the next 3 weeks, these tiny sprouts of new leaves became 3 inches of curly lettuce leaves and more began to grow.

Today, I decided it was time to place them in their permanent home.

I took my old cat litter container that I had disinfected a few weeks ago and drilled drainage holes in the bottom. I added a 4 inch mixture of garden soil and peat moss in the bottom and topped it with 2 inches of organic potting soil.

Inside this container, I placed all 5 lettuce seedlings, each spaced about 8-12 inches from each other.

I then sprinkled the plants with blood meal fertilizer since we have a lot of rabbits in our yard and I am fearful of my lettuce becoming dinner for someone other than me!

Tip: Blood meal is a good deterrent for rabbits. I have not used it on vegetables yet, but have had success keeping the rabbits from my flowers with it.

I am extremely excited and proud of my little lettuce seedlings. I will keep you updated on their progress.

30 Day Challenge

I hope you are finding useful information in my 30 Day Challenge articles. From designing your garden, building your raised bed, planting your seeds, and transplanting them to their permanent homes, I research every step of the process and share my knowledge with you.

If you have questions or concerns about your garden and its progress, post them here or on my blog. I will do my best to help you.