Weather and soil permitting, Presidents Day Weekend is when the gardening season begins for me, with last year's tomato beds turned over, amended, and strewn with a little bone meal in preparation for my first planting of snow and snap peas. And this dry, sunny weekend was no disappointment.

If that seems like a little early to be direct sowing seeds in the garden (in addition to peas, I also sowed a few feet of lettuce), well, some years it is, but the seeds are cheap, the sowing easy, and the rewards of an early crop uniquely gratifying. There's simply nothing quite like eating out of your own garden after another dull, gray Seattle winter.

Up next: arugula, mustard greens, broccoli raab, and of course radishes, the ultimate crop for the impatient.