Gardening

One of my latest hobbies has become gardening. Up until now I thought I was cursed with a black thumb, seriously, every plant I ever touched seemed to die no matter what I did. I was a little hesitant to start a garden, but I really wanted to try after seeing how fun it was when Morgan's parents had their garden growing. It turns out I have a little bit of a green thumb after all.
I planted a bunch of different things this year to see how they would grow: Carrots, Cucumbers, Purple cabbage, Green Beans, Peas, Onions (yellow and white), Radish, Lettuce, Swiss Chard, Cauliflower, Spinach, Marigolds, Spaghetti Squash, Butternut Squash, Zucchini, Yellow Squash, an assortment of Bell Peppers, and assortment of Heirloom Tomatoes, Okra, Watermelon, Pumpkin, a few spices, I think a spicy basil, rosemary, cilantro, and parsley.
It's been really exciting and faith building to watch my plants grow. Since this year was experimental, I used up 3 boxes that are 4X16. In one I did a great mix of peat moss, vermiculite, and compost...not quite Square Foot Gardening caliber, but pretty close, the next box I did less peat moss and just compost, and the last box I did nothing. Mostly I took on more boxes because the neighbors were deciding they didn't want to do as much this year, and since we didn't want to see empty boxes in our community garden we all sort of pitched in on the extra boxes.
The soil we started out with was pretty awful and very rocky, but surprisingly things have still been growing, I think in the soil with nothing added we have a couple zucchini plants and yellow squash sprouting as well as a few cucumber plants.
We love going for walks each morning and watering the garden and taking a look at what is growing and sprouting. Logan joins in my enthusiasm when I'm overjoyed when something finally sprouts. I think now everything has, so now it's just going to be a test of my patience while I wait for everything to grow and produce. I can't wait to eat from my own garden. I think I do have some spinach that I could probably go cut in the next few days. Good thing my boys like spinach smoothies. :)

The biggest struggle of the garden has been the wind. It really dries out the plants and it's pretty much always windy, so I have to water pretty much everyday, but I don't mind, it's been fun to get to know the garden. I did lose a whole bunch of tomato and pepper plants though when I big windstorm hit, I was devastated, so I went to the store to buy replacements and the next day after I planted them another big windstorm was threatening to kill them again, so I hurried to the store and picked up the green water towers that you see. They block the wind, protect the plants, keep them warmer at night and I think they look pretty cool too. :) And you can leave them on the entire season and they are supposed to grow even better, so we'll see. So until harvest....