I made an amateur mistake at the swap.

Last night I went to a lovely little potluck and seed/plant swap with some of the girls from You Grow Girl at Naomi’s (a.k.a. Nanaimo) place in the west end of Toronto. I unloaded a couple of the tiger kitten rex begonias I rooted back on February 21st, along with two spider plants and the umbrella plant I had rooted in water.

In return I picked up two different little rex begonias and a nutmeg scented geranium, along with a handful of seeds:

• Lettuce, Rouge d’Hiver (courtesy of Cristine)
• Arugala (also courtesy of Cristine)
• Zinnia, Giant Double, Mixed Colours (thanks, Melamalie!)
• Zinnia, Thumbelina (courtesy of Sorellina)
• Blue Spice Basil (also courtesy of Melamalie)
• Radicchio, “Variegata di Castel Franco” (thanks for this one and the rest to Gayla)
• Hot Pepper “Variegata” with TRICOLOURED FOLIAGE!
• Hot Pepper “Lemon Drop”
• Cucumber, “Parisian Pickling”

Also present were Vanmessa (chocolate pecan pie artist) and Dee, making a total of eight site members together in one room. So what if we needed nametags at first? We made personal connections through the Internet, revealing to me again how much it has become about connecting with people and community.

Such enthusiastic swapping!I’ll admit something absolutely ridiculous here on this blog, even though I know some of the girls who attended last night will read this and laugh…it was sort of hard to sit there and watch people I’d just met paw through my seed collection! PHEW, there, I said it. I brought my whole box of seeds because I didn’t have time to sort through them all. The thing is, today I noticed that one of my favourites didn’t make it back to Bowmanville. Not one single Black Velvet Nasturtium seed came back home to grow in my garden, and the packet was brand stinkin’ new when I got to the potluck. Yes I’m complaining, and no, it isn’t a big deal, but to paraphrase Gayla, “First rule of Seed Swap: Don’t bring anything you want to keep.”