So how did I make it work?
I carted them outside.
Every day.
Twice a day.
And covered them on nasty days or put them in the car on really bad days.
This sort of thing will only work if you live somewhere it’s above freezing outside during the day. Its in the high 40’s low 50’s on an average nasty day here which is fine for the starts once they are up.

The trick is that you have to keep them inside, warm and moist until they sprout. We quadruple stacked ours so I still had some semblance of a kitchen and cranked the heater. It’s downright tropical in our house and will stay that way until everything’s come up or I give up on pots.

Morning and night I go through all the pots that haven’t sprouted  since the last time I checked and look for just emerging seedlings. Those are moved into top trays to go outside during the day. As more and more come up you can stack fewer and fewer trays on top of each other. It started to get crazy fitting everything in our tiny apartment about a week ago. 

Which makes taking them outside even more important, because to get in the freezer -oh wait we don’t have one right now, thanks broken freezer for making life even more complicated, really appreciate that- or do much of anything in the kitchen the trays have to be moved.
As you can tell this is not an ideal method but it works and sometimes that’s all that matters. If you find yourself needing to start plants without grow lights there are a few other things to be aware of:

Make sure critters can’t eat/dig up/ roll on your starts.
 Livestock, wildlife and pets are all equally problematic. This is the biggest concern when they are itty bitty. I cover mine with clear drawers from a fridge, cut up milk jugs and the plastic containers that you buy greens in. It ain’t pretty folks but it works. 

Wind can be just as dangerous as hale or rain.
It sucks the moisture right out of plants and will rip the leaves off baby plants in no time.

A really sunny day after a stretch of cloudy days can sunburn your plants.  
Sunburn shows up as leaves that are totally dried up and dead looking when they were previously perfectly normal. If you start seeing it move the affected starts to a shaded area. Some plants seem to get this more than others, our melons and cucumbers seem to be the worst off and some but not all of our cosmos also sunburned. 

Starting plants without grow lights takes more time and effort to be successful with. This just goes to show that if you really want a garden nothing should stand in your way! I haven’t posted any photos of the garden spot yet so I thought you might all like a glimpse into our weed patch.
 I’m totally serious. 
We have lots of them and they are awesome because its free bunny food, I’m always looking to stretch a bag of feed.

Here are “Before and After” photos. We have a lot of work to do yet but we’ve also accomplished a lot!

So how did I make it work?
I carted them outside.
Every day.
Twice a day.
And covered them on nasty days or put them in the car on really bad days.
This sort of thing will only work if you live somewhere it’s above freezing outside during the day. Its in the high 40’s low 50’s on an average nasty day here which is fine for the starts once they are up.

The trick is that you have to keep them inside, warm and moist until they sprout. We quadruple stacked ours so I still had some semblance of a kitchen and cranked the heater. It’s downright tropical in our house and will stay that way until everything’s come up or I give up on pots.

Morning and night I go through all the pots that haven’t sprouted  since the last time I checked and look for just emerging seedlings. Those are moved into top trays to go outside during the day. As more and more come up you can stack fewer and fewer trays on top of each other. It started to get crazy fitting everything in our tiny apartment about a week ago. 

Which makes taking them outside even more important, because to get in the freezer -oh wait we don’t have one right now, thanks broken freezer for making life even more complicated, really appreciate that- or do much of anything in the kitchen the trays have to be moved.
As you can tell this is not an ideal method but it works and sometimes that’s all that matters. If you find yourself needing to start plants without grow lights there are a few other things to be aware of:

Make sure critters can’t eat/dig up/ roll on your starts.
 Livestock, wildlife and pets are all equally problematic. This is the biggest concern when they are itty bitty. I cover mine with clear drawers from a fridge, cut up milk jugs and the plastic containers that you buy greens in. It ain’t pretty folks but it works. 

Wind can be just as dangerous as hale or rain.
It sucks the moisture right out of plants and will rip the leaves off baby plants in no time.

A really sunny day after a stretch of cloudy days can sunburn your plants.  
Sunburn shows up as leaves that are totally dried up and dead looking when they were previously perfectly normal. If you start seeing it move the affected starts to a shaded area. Some plants seem to get this more than others, our melons and cucumbers seem to be the worst off and some but not all of our cosmos also sunburned. 

Starting plants without grow lights takes more time and effort to be successful with. This just goes to show that if you really want a garden nothing should stand in your way! I haven’t posted any photos of the garden spot yet so I thought you might all like a glimpse into our weed patch.
 I’m totally serious. 
We have lots of them and they are awesome because its free bunny food, I’m always looking to stretch a bag of feed.

Here are “Before and After” photos. We have a lot of work to do yet but we’ve also accomplished a lot!