Saving Cash on New Seeds

About this time of year the seed and plant catalogs have great sales. Their big spring seed/plant ordering season is over and they are trying to unload their leftovers for greatly reduced prices on suckers like me. Of course I'm one of those fools who subscribes to the newsletters so I have minute by minute notice of pending sales. Maybe a month ago Thompson & Morgan had a teaser- No Shipping!  Wait for it. Wait for it. Next came, Buy One Get One Free. Oh, so tempting. I even scrolled through the selection and made a pretend order in my head, but I held out. Delayed gratification. And finally- 75% off! Ok- that was my hook. At this point there wasn't a huge selection left, but good enough for an addict. I found 12 packs I HAD to have. Agastache- fragrant mix and Apricot Sprite, Royal White Snapdragons (these are tall and supposedly fragrant), Musa lasiocarpa (my first banana!), Summer Purple Broccoli, Brugmansia- Summer Sunrise, Dianthus- microchips and arctic fire, Echinacea- Magic Box mix, Princess of India Nasturtium, Oenothera- Lemon Sunset and Perpetual Spinach (one for summer?!).  Oh my!  The cost per packet was $1.70. Usually these seeds are $3-4+ per. Of course, shipping killed me, but even including it the cost per packet was $2.29, which is far less than I would of paid at full price and these are varieties of plants I can't find in seeds at the local stores.

I've started the Musa and Brugmansia. The banana can take anywhere from 30-180 days to germinate. Dear Banana seeds, please germinate this summer, because my basement is cool and you won't love it then.  I'll give updates on birthdays for the Musa and Brugs (if we have them).

My ultimate goal in all this is to be able to save the plants that I do grow (by overwintering) so I don't have to buy them again or saving seed from successful varieties (saving me $).  BTW- I really like Thompson & Morgan because they have the largest selection of seeds of any catalog I receive and lots of stuff you can't find elsewhere, including tropicals and unusual vines. Fun stuff.