ellen 
I like rainy days. The sound of a gentle rain, the grey of the sky, and the way too many cups of coffee. With all that caffine, your mind can really get rolling. It’s a reflective time, and you may sit thinking of all the millions of things you want to do. Write them down. It is really not a time to be out in your garden. If it is a light, short rain, you can do a few tasks. Generally though, if it gets heavy or is an all day affair, just read a good book or spend some time cleaning your garden tools. In a light rain, you can go weed. Those plants in the wrong place pull out with little effort, root and all. It is best for smaller to medium sized weeds, although sometimes you can give a good tug to a larger one, close to the soil line, to get it all. You don’t want to go digging or even wander around too much on a wet day. It will only compact your soil and cause more harm than good. To make sure you don’t compact the soil, stay on hard surfaced paths or hang out inside. Don’t dig, that is for sure. Digging and walking on wet soil pushes all the air out and makes it very hard for things to take root.
Early, before for the real rain comes, these days can be good times to sow surface seeds. I threw down some snap dragon, crimson clover, and lightly touched the soil to do a few spots of a mini carrot called, Tonda di Parigi. This carrot is bulbous and has shallow roots. Having just started my beds this year, my thoughts were, “a shallow root carrot should do well with the depth of the bed I made.” So, that is how I decided on this carrot. It should reach maturity in 65 days, around mid to late September, giving me plenty of time for another few sowings in the coming weeks. I had hopes to sow some salad turnips, but the rain got steady and there is no need to mess with the soil once the rain really starts coming down.
The best advice for a rainy day really is, let the rain barrel collect water and stay out of the garden.
