Beans and Beets...

I decided to be a bit more adventurous with my bean seeds while still using recycled items from my house.  I saved and cleaned my yogurt containers for planting the bean seeds and the box and plastic mold from a box of chocolates Chris gave me to allow the water to drain and be caught.  I turned the plastic mold upside-down and placed it in of the bottom portion of the box.  The plan was to use the top as the plastic cover during germination, but the research I did on bean seeds basically said they don't need the same treatment as the more fragile tomato seeds.  So no cover for you!  I used my trusty phillips head screw driver to poke three holes along the bottom of the yogurt container, to allow for ample draining. 

As for the beets, I simply planted them directly in the pot they will be harvested in. 

I filled the yogurt containers 1/2 full with the compost/vermeculite mix which was saturated with diluted tomato feed.  Since my containers are only 2" tall, 1/2 full was necessary, but not ideal.  My research recommended I use containers that were at least 3" tall; planting the seed 1" from the surface and allowing the roots 2" of space to grow prior to transplanting.  I focused on the seed being 1" from the surface of the mix.  Since my tomato plants grew successfully with much less space in the soil than was suggested to me, I am hoping 1" will be plenty of room for the bean roots.  

Once they were topped up with the mix, I placed them on the upside-down plastic molds.  I made sure the holes I created at the bottom would allow the water to drain directly into the open space underneath.

For the beets, all I did was fill the pot with the saturated mix with.  I left roughly 1 1/4" of space at the top, thinly spread my beet seeds and covered them with the mix, leaving 1/4 - 1/2" at the top.  I kept it inside over night.