SlimeyOkra, your weather sounds much like ours. It's been a VERY dry spring - only had 4/10 of rain so far - which has been very welcome given all the flooding we've had here for the past four years. Some of the farmers around us are finally reclaiming some of their land. :) We don't really grow greens most years, but have been eating asparagus and rhubarb for over a week now. I'm still putting out transplants, which isn't unusual for early June for us. Tomatoes and peppers and pole beans are the last to go out. I don't do much fussing to get early crops. The peas are up nicely, though. This year was the earliest I've ever gotten them planted!

With enough fertilizer, you should get a decent amount of tops and very small bulbs. I'd say just plant them close (I'd also check just where in China they came from ... I agree that normally seed planted in October should be a short day variety but you might just get lucky so it might be worth a chance to try and start some inside in Late February and set them out in Late April / early May and see what happens. Also, based on what I know of your zone I would only be putting plants and maybe sets in around late April / early May since seed would want to have been started at least a couple of months earlier indoors.

We were at a gathering of my wife's family in Vermont for New Years. I was volunteered to cook dinner on New Year's eve. I wasn't quite sure what to make but the two previous nights there was Jambalaya, then Chicken Enchiladas, I felt I had to go in a different direction. At first I was planning and buying ingredients to make an Irish Beef Stew, for about 25 people, but after getting back to the house from the store and remembering that I had brought a container of the spice blend Ras el Hanout, I decided to change it up and make Moroccan Beef Stew. Whatever that is, :-) I had purchased about 13 lbs of sirloin roast, plus onions, carrots, parsnips, green peas, and yukon gold potatoes, I decided that the onions, carrots and parsnips would work, but I should not use the potatoes and should instead use sweet potatoes. Fortuitously a nephew had brought a large box of carrots, winter squash, and sweet potatoes from his nearby farm, so i felt I was good to go. I cubed the meat, and liberally sprinkled it with the spice blend, plus some cumin, coriander, and cinnamon, which were probably in the blend but not enough, and left the meat sit in the walk-in-fridge/unheated garage overnight. The next afternoon I started cutting up the vegetables, and browning the meat, and started two pots simmering with the meat and onions. After a couple of hours, I also cubed a butternut squash, and roasted it, and then added all of the vegetables to the stew, and cooked it another 45 minutes. Someone else helped out by making a large rice pilaf, (although couscous would have been a better option) and although I felt the stew wasn't quite thick enough, everyone raved about how good it tasted. After a little more refinement to the recipe I think it will be a real winner.

"When our contractor called us last week to let us know he has pneumonia he told us that we could terminate the contract with him. We let our contractor know that we would like to keep the contract with him and have him complete the work." WHY? WHY WHY WHY??? This is a guy who has no clue how to schedule. At the point he was behind, he SHOULD NOT HAVE DONE YOUR DEMO. He should have given you the opt out, in FEBRUARY before the rip of the kitchen, and told YOU to delay your flooring, which could have been done after the kitchen with a simple shimming up of lower cabinetry install. Check your local area for good referrals, get your money back , and move on. In the meantime, a good contractor can give you a temporary counter space with a sink, you put the fridge somewhere with a microwave, and you have to find someone to finish the entire job.