15/03/09 Planting Sunflowers

I noticed that the Council are running a 'tallest sunflower' competition this year and I had been trying to think of something to grow with Ben, so I asked him if he wanted to have a go.

We started with a trip to Tong Garden Centre and after looking at the animals, fish and the fountains, bought the seeds, pots and compost.

As we might actually get round to entering the competition, I decided to let Ben do the work, with just a little supervision. Ben might not have a competitive streak yet, but I do ;-)

Here he is filling the pots with compost.

Planting the seeds in the pots. He did need some help with this because he was shoving the seeds so far down in the pots they would have taken months to come up!

Finally, watering the seeds. Because I'm a bit sad, we have planted two varieties - 'Giant Single' and 'Titan' - both of which sound like promising names for giant sunflowers! If anyone has any tips for growing really big sunflowers, I'd love to hear them. Ben really enjoyed himself and even helped to sweep all the compost off the patio. All we need now is for them to grow!