Plant-based Progress and YOE #2

How we all holding up out there? Another day at home, another house project to start and lose interest in and motivation for halfway through, right? 😊 Kidding but not really. It’s funny because under normal circumstances, don’t we all pine for days at home in our pajamas with nothing to do? But clearly too much of anything gets old.

I’m trying to stay healthy by doing the things that I enjoy, mainly exercising and being outside. I’m so thankful this is happening during the Spring and not the Winter. Lord help us if we were 100% confined to the indoors. I’ve been going for walks, doing my kettle bells, hitting the punching bag, and gardening. Don’t want to jinx anything, but by being home this much, there is absolutely no reason why my garden shouldn’t be amazing this year.

Speaking of my garden, take a look at these little pieces of eye candy. Last Fall, I planted a little bit of mint, a very sad sage plant, and a nearly dead parsley plant. Lo and behold, look who is perky and vibrant. I had read about kitchen gardens (or some call them ‘cottage gardens’) last year and it made a lot of sense to have some herbs right outside the kitchen for easy access.

Healthy and vibrant parsley plant in the sun

Robust mint plant growing next to lattice fence

Here’s my bimonthly update on my 2020 plant-based eating (aka eat less meat) goal. For whatever reason, my appetite has disappeared during this shelter in place extravaganza. Breakfast is pretty basic (cereal, yogurt, scrambled eggs, or waffles), lunch is usually a salad and/or sandwich, and by dinner I would love nothing more than an adult drink and some cheese and crackers but we are doing relatively well on making balanced, colorful dinners.

In March, here’s what I did –

Week 1: I love these lasagna roll-ups and usually make a double batch so that I can put the extra in the freezer and pull it out a few weeks later.
Week 2: I made Indian food and only did vegetarian dishes – chana masala, palak paneer, and curry.
Week 3: Similar to a previous meal, we had pasta with red sauce and I just swapped out regular meatballs with Pure Farmland’s plant-based meatballs instead. These are really good!
Week 4: Whenever it’s rainy and cold, tomato soup and grilled cheese (with a few pickles and slices of avocado stuffed inside) hits the spot.

April went like this –

Week 1: Ziti with red sauce and sauteed spinach added to the sauce.
Week 2: Cheese paninis with roasted veggies. A friend of mine told me about roasting veggies like zucchini, peppers and eggplant in the panini maker, just brushing with some olive oil and sprinkling with salt and pepper, and we love it.
Week 3: Black bean burgers are a family favorite in my house. Add some avocado, tomato and lettuce, and some corn on the cob, and yum yum yum!
Week 4: Quiche with spinach and peas and a nice salad. You could do broccoli also or peppers. Pretty much whatever strikes your fancy. It’s essentially a breakfast for dinner situation.

Other progress has been eating more salads for lunch. As the weather warms up (and that’s been pretty fickle) I’m much more inclined to eat a salad as a meal. In the winter, heck no. I’ve also been having sliced peppers and cucumbers with lunch every day.

Learnings:
– Still going kind of heavy on cheese but I think I’m improving.
– Pasta variations are limitless. I think we eat pasta every week and it is super easy to throw beans or spinach into a sauce, or sauté some zucchini and add on top.

YOE – year of enough update

Well, nothing like not being able to leave the house to help me stop buying unnecessary stuff. I guess I could be going crazy with online shopping but if I had any downtime to be scrolling through my phone, shopping is not what I’d be doing. I’d probably be researching future vacation destinations but that seems highly premature.

As I mentioned, been spending time almost every day out in the garden and that is super satisfying. All this family time too, though I might very well be losing my mind, has really reinforced what’s important. I think if there is one thing that I’m trying to learn during YOE is to enjoy today. Of course it’s important to plan for the future, but happiness and fun shouldn’t be put off for another day. Making contentment contingent upon ‘when my bank account has this much money’ or ‘when I finally get promoted to X’ or ‘when I eventually lose 5/10/XX pounds’ means I’m always looking down the road, not at what’s right in front of me. On a daily basis, it also shows up as ‘I’ll let myself relax or play once I get my to do list done’ which means it’s usually 10pm when I finally allow myself some ‘me time’ and by then I’m so exhausted I just want to pass out, so what’s the point.

I guess what I’m trying to learn could be summed up in all those cliché expressions about dancing in the rain instead of waiting for the storm to pass. But it my life, it would more accurately be laughing and rolling around in the chaos instead of constantly trying to contain it.

Keeping Busy, Staying Sane

Well this is not how I pictured April panning out. I’m not one to plan out my life weeks in advance, but not leaving my house for four weeks straight was certainly not my ideal scenario, or yours I’m guessing. Regardless, I hope you are healthy and safe wherever you are. I hope you have food to eat and loved ones to check in with. As many negatives as this situation is presenting, there are definitely some significant positives. However, I’m not about to sugar coat it. Lots of ups and downs in our household. Thankfully more ups. I don’t have any answers or solutions but I can say Cactus and I do infinitely better on the days when we each get an hour of ‘me’ time. Preferably outside, with some fresh air, doing something active. It clears my head, helps me slow down the thoughts that were starting to go on over drive, and gives me the mental re-boot to make the rest of the day more enjoyable.

Besides checking the calendar to remind myself what day it is, here’s what I’ve been up.

Nursing my seedlings. I’d say about 50% of my seedlings are going strong. The peppers are on fire. A bunch of my tomatoes and peas fizzled out and I think I’m to blame. I put them out on a really warm day for some fresh air and I think it shocked them. If you are approaching your last frost date, be sure you do the hardening off gradually. Like 2 hours one day, then 3 hours, then 5 hours, then 6 hours, etc. It takes a little more attention but it’s worth it to not kill the plants you were just babying for the last 8 weeks.

Pepper and tomato seedlings that are strong healthy — 8 week old pepper (left) and tomato (right) seedlings doing just fine…

Pea, pepper and tomato seedlings that are struggling — 8 week old pepper (top) and pea (bottom) seedlings doing less than fine (there was not that much space between them – I’ve lost about 10 plants).

Planted my cool crops. I sowed my kale, onions, carrots, beets, cauliflower and broccoli directly in the ground in the beginning of April. Last year, I didn’t attempt a Spring garden so I’m curious to see if they take hold. I had a great kale and beet harvest, but I did them in the Summer just a single time with no succession planting for the Fall. I’m hoping that my rotation and all the manure and compost I’ve added make a difference. Even though I have read about 100 times that soil testing is a must, I have not yet done it. I am promising myself I will do it at the end of the season this year so I can amend as needed for next year.

Homemade teepee trellis. I experimented making a teepee trellis with some old blackberry canes. I’m not sure how sturdy this will be. I really want to use bamboo and I see walls of bamboo in yards when I drive around town, but I haven’t had the courage to knock on someone’s door and ask “Can I cut a few of your bamboo stalks?”

Blackberry canes lying on the ground — Some blackberry canes that I pruned for a potential teepee.

Four blackberry canes standing up to be secured as a teepee trellis — Four blackberry canes standing up for a teepee trellis.

Teepee trellis made out of four blackberry canes — Securing the four blackberry canes with twine.

Chick wrangling. Our four chicks (2 Isa Browns and 2 Gold Leaf Wyandottes) are alive and well in the bathtub. They are getting pretty big and almost all of their fluffy down is gone so we’ll be ready to take them out and introduce them to the rest of the flock in the next two weeks I think. I’m a little disheartened that two appear to be roosters. I could be wrong *fingers crossed*.

One month old 2 Isa Brown and 2 Gold Leaf Wyandottes chicks in white bath tub — Look at the comb coming in so strong on the dark one in the back – grrrrr. You better not be a rooster!

Starting a Garden? How to Plan for Success

Oh joy, oh joy, oh joy!! I never thought I would geek out over seed catalogs but I have been giddy with anticipation. I wasn’t sure where to start but I knew I only wanted to order heirloom seeds, so that was my search term “heirloom seed company.” Here are the ones I found –

Annie’s Heirloom Seeds
Baker Creek
High Mowing Seeds
Johnny’s Selected Seeds
Seed Savers Exchange
Southern Exposure Seed Exchange

Beyond finding the company, I wanted to be able to receive a hard copy catalog and not have to search through a website. I know, not very earth friendly but since I’m a newbie to gardening I wanted to be able to thumb through pages, write notes in the sidebars, dogear pages, etc. I also wanted to only get one catalog to avoid giving myself so many choices that I would never be able to make a decision. I landed on Baker Creek and it is gorgeous!

However, let me give a warning that if you sit down with a 150-200+ page catalog you are going to get overwhelmed. It is best to start with a list of the vegetables and fruits you know want to grow.

How do you know what you want to grow? Start by asking yourself a few questions.

What do I like to eat? What does my family like to eat? If you are someone who makes a weekly menu or meal plan, look back at what you’ve eaten for the last 6-8 weeks. You’ll likely see some trends. Do you have a meal with tomato sauce/base once a week? Do you eat a big salad with dinner once each week? Do your kids love to snack on carrots or cucumbers with hummus? If you don’t make a meal plan, what are the 5-10 recipes you make most often? What are the ingredients you could grow yourself?
Do I want to grow vegetables, fruit or both? This may be less of a “do I want to?” question and more of a “what do I have space for?” question. I would caution against trying to do too much your first few gardening seasons (talking to myself here too). But doing five or six veggies and getting one to two blueberry bushes in the ground is very doable. Aiming to build slightly off of each previous growing season is good approach to keep things realistic and allows you to learn from your successes and misses.
What do I have space for? Do you plan to grow directly in the ground, raised beds or containers? Or a combination? The spacing instructions on a seed packet are pretty accurate. You can try to tighten things up a bit but then you may limit your harvest.
What do I have time for? This is extremely important and also difficult to answer. I can’t tell you how much time 15 green bean plants, 10 tomato plants, five pepper plants and three different lettuces will take to tend to each week. Again, I would say err on the side of assuming you have less time and then you’ll be pleasantly surprised if you are out in the garden more and everything grows super well.

Now that you’ve answered those questions, you can open up the heavenly pages of whichever seed catalog(s) you chose and let the angels sing in the background.

From my year one garden lessons, I pretty much knew what vegetables were on my list, I just needed to decide on my bean, lettuce, pepper and tomato varieties. Here’s what I decided on.

Two seed packets for Calima and Golden Butterwax beans from Baker Creek

Two seed packets for german pink and Martino's Roma tomatoes from Baker Creek

Two seed packets for echinace and Russian red kale from Baker Creek

Beans – Calima and Golden Butterwax
Beets – golden and red
Carrots – St. Valery
Cucumber – Muncher
Kale – Blue Curled Scotch
Lettuce – Parris Island Cos (Romaine), Buttercrunch and Spinach
Peppers – Bell, Fish and Jalapeno
Tomatoes – German Pink and Martino’s Roma
**Bonus – Baker Creek sends a pack of mystery seeds for every seven packets you buy. I got a packet of Russian Red Kale and Echinacea – SCORE!!!

Next time, we’ll walk through deciding how many of each to plant.

First Year Garden Learnings – Part Two

Howdy again. I’m back with part two of my first year garden learnings. I’m glad I took notes and will continue to do so. Doing this lookback is also helping me think through some of my plans a little more deeply, which is good.

What I hope to improve next year:

The blueberry ambush. We will have to rewire our electric fence. The deer in our area are out of control and they are not taking my blueberries again. The Deer Chaser was not enough of a deer-terrant. Ha ha ha, I had to.

The single blueberry that the deer left behind on Farm Charm — The lone blueberry that the deer left

Carrots and cucumbers. Total flop. Nothing ever sprouted and I tried carrots twice – once in the spring and fall. Grrrr!

Starting my seeds in an egg carton. The cucumbers never sprouted. — Every other seed I started grew, except the cucumbers and carrots (which were directly seeded).

Fig Fail. Wah! I believe a few things worked against us. I don’t think we pruned enough of the old growth or insulated the roots during the colder months. I reached out to the previous owner as well and he said that some years were a miss as well for them.

Kale caterpillars. I had to rinse all my kale like 9 times before I used it and I’m sure I still ate extra protein without knowing. Not that big of a deal, but it did slightly lessen my enjoyment of the salads. However, not worried about worms at all from the bags of kale I froze and am putting in smoothies. I’m trying to keep my garden chemical free so will need to figure out how to keep these caterpillars out.

Tomatoes a-go-go. Since I hope to do more canning next year, I am not going to exclusively plant the small guys.

The layout. I feel like the location for where I planted squash and lettuce could be improved. The squash needs room to spread but also needs to be contained somehow. The two butternut plants took over the entire corner of the garden and grew through the fence. For the lettuce, not sure if it was due to soil or sunlight, but my lettuce leaf varieties did not take hold the way I would have hoped.

Spacing. Green beans need their space. So do tomato plants. This is true both horizontally and vertically. I will need to create better trellising configurations. For the green beans, I made a teepee that was not tall enough, only about 3 feet tall. Next year I will make it at least 5 feet tall and just plant 1-2 plants at each leg of the teepee. Personally, I don’t think tomato cages get the job done. The plants get tangled in them and they can still tip over. I’d really like to have some sort of bar suspended above them that they can grow up to.

No compost bed. I will not be dedicating a garden bed to composting. It became intractable and overgrown and my garden does not have extra space. Plus we have three other compost piles.

Take pictures of everything! Since I’m out in the garden so much and my memory is so, so spotty, I want to put a reminder on my phone to take a picture once each week. This will be a great visual record of where stuff was planted, how quickly it grew (or didn’t grow), etc. The challenge will be remembering to take my phone. I enjoy my gardening time as a way of being outside away from screens.

New veggies I want to try to grow:

Broccoli
Brussel sprouts
Collard greens
Golden beets
Spinach

What I will NOT be growing next year:

Strawberries – I had four strawberry plants and as you know they were a great source of sustenance for what I guess were a local bunny family. I think we only ate 10-12 strawberries tops. I’m sure I could learn more about caging them in a way that allows them to spread while being protected, but they seem like more trouble than they are worth at this stage of my gardening game.

Farm Charm tomato cages wrapped in netting to protect my strawberry plants — My strawberry plant cages. These were good in theory but didn’t allow the plants to spread.

First Year Garden Learnings – Part One

One of the things I have heard and read over and over from other gardeners and homesteaders is to take lots of notes throughout the year so that I’ll know to adjust things a few days/weeks earlier or later for next time. I’m curious how helpful this will be with the climate changing as much as it seems to be in such a short period of time.

I feel like all I hear is “this isn’t typical” or “the unusual weather we’ve been having” or the “unseasonably warm/wet/dry…” etc., etc. So I guess we’ll see what the next cycle of seasons brings for my gardening endeavors. Here are some of the big takeaways from my first year and I feel pretty positive on the whole.

What Went Well – the dubya dubya dubya

Arugula: My two arugula plants are more like bushes. I have done absolutely nothing in the way of nurturing them and they just keep flourishing.

Beets: Oh heavenly sweet beets. They were huge and juicy. If only I had pickled them to preserve the bounty.

Berries: Taking no personal credit, the black raspberries were insane and the raspberries were quite good. I will just have to make more of an effort to collect them routinely.

Butternut squash: By far the MVP of this year. Holy moly I think I had about 20 butternut squashes from two plants. They grew all over the place (which I will need to work on next year) but every single one of them has been 1000% delicious. Better than any I have ever bought from the store.

Green beans: I had more than I knew what to do with all to be harvested at the same time. Next year, definitely going to try canning some.

Peppers: I had jalapenos and bell peppers. Not too many, could probably plant one more plant of each to have extra that I chop up and put in the freezer for the winter.

Tomatoes: I did all small varieties because I love them on salads and as salads (caprese, cowgirl caviar, etc.).

Watermelon: This was just an experiment and we got three watermelons! The location will need to be re-thought (similar to the squash) but I was surprised anything even took.

Beetles and the Beans

Tale as old as time, true as it can be… Just kidding, making a very dorky play on Beauty and the Beast with my post. My green beans have been doing very well. A number of people had told me to plant green beans as they were basically fool proof. I love disclaimers like that because I can pretty much guarantee it won’t be that straightforward for me.

I had read that it was helpful to sprout the seeds in a moist towel for 2-3 days before directly sowing them in the ground. That worked really well. I just used an old wash cloth, dampened it slightly, rolled about 12 seeds up, and left it on the kitchen counter in a produce bag from the grocery store so that it stayed warm and moist. I checked it each day to make sure it was still damp and then three days later every seed had a sprout shooting out. Then I planted all the seeds outside.

I will say I did not follow the instructions on the packet regarding spacing. I think I was just so happy that all seeds had sprouted and I wanted to use every last one. I had only designated half of one of my garden beds to beans so this was about a 4×4 foot square that I planted 12 bean plants in. Learning #1: follow the instructions on plant spacing. I have learned it doesn’t do me any good to have a big jumble of plants that I won’t be able to tend. The spacing recommendations are to allow each plant to grow and thrive. Sounds obvious, but so is a STOP sign and we don’t all follow those.

Speaking of jumble, Learning #2: doing a trellis or some other support structure for bean plants (and other vining or wandering plants) is necessary. I really liked this video from Melissa Norris on building a teepee trellis and used this concept for my green beans. However, I don’t think I built my two teepees tall enough. My teepees were only about 4 feet tall so as the plants grew to the top, they just wound back down and became a big interwoven mix up. Having too many plants probably also contributed to this scenario. I think what I will try next year is to plant one plant at the base of each leg of my teepee, not more than 6-8 plants, and make the teepee at least 5 feet tall. I will also allot an entire garden bed to the beans and maybe just plant a few marigolds in the corners because….

Learning #3: Japanese beetles are no joke. For about 2-3 weeks I was going out to my bean plants every few days and picking at least a 2 pounds of green beans. I was noticing that the leaves were getting eaten but being the novice that I am, I wasn’t sure how much of that was par for the course. I know there are going to be bugs and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to use any chemicals on the fruits and veggies that I grow, so I understand there will be some food sharing. But dang! These beetles are greedy and destructive. One afternoon, I finally said wait a minute and while I was picking the beans I paid better attention to any bugs I could see. And guess who was all up in my face, not even trying to be slick about their thievery? These guys! So I quickly googled and learned these are Japanese beetles, they are quite a nuisance, and there are a couple remedies to fight back. The approach I chose was to knock them off the plants into a bucket of water, kind of like this guy from the Maine Co-op Extension. That isn’t a long-term solution so I may look into some sort of spray or insecticidal soap next year but for now it’s all learning.

That’s one of the main reasons I am trying to write as much of this stuff down. I have no gardening experience whatsoever and it will take many years for me to get the hang of this stuff. And if I try to rely on memory – FOR-GET-IT!!!

Berry Fest

We have begun to reap quite a bounty of berries. The previous owners of our property had a sizable berry establishment going. There are a couple of massive blackberry bushes growing in one spot and then a tunnel of blackberry bushes; an entire forest of black raspberry bushes; and maybe three or four blueberry bushes. I also planted four strawberry plants but you may recall I had an issue with bunnies eating them.

The blackberry bush tunnel on Farm Charm — The blackberry bush tunnel

As someone who is brand new to growing food, I am still learning how much effort and time is needed. With regard to the berry bushes (and they are pretty hands off), should I be checking on them every day, every other day or is twice a week sufficient? I am a schedule person and like knowing what I need to do each day. I’m sure it is my life’s lesson to realize that it’s not about checking things off, it’s about enjoying the process, but we can save that philosophizing for another day.

The outside of the blackberry bush tunnel on Farm Charm — The blackberry bush tunnel from the outside

I’m also asking because I had a disappointing experience with the blueberries just a few days ago and wondering whether it could have been prevented had I been more vigilant. I was watching them for about two weeks. The berries started small and green, then turned to grayish purple, then a light blue, and then a nice rich dark blue. On Friday evening, I could see that they were all getting very close to perfection and I wanted to wait one more day so they could be as juicy and plump as possible. And then, for whatever reason, I didn’t do the picking on Saturday like I should have and when I went out Sunday morning, they were ALL GONE!

I know the deer ate them, those punks! We have an electric fence around the garden but I haven’t turned it on. Up to this point it didn’t appear that the deer had been noshing on our fruit bushes. But they must have been watching me watch the blueberries and picked the most opportune time to make their move. Grrrrrr!

So to my question about frequency. Could I have prevented this by checking the berries on Saturday? Maybe. To be on top of things, I should probably be checking on the things that are getting close to ripe every day during harvest season but I just know that isn’t going to be entirely realistic. But the berries are worth it.

Three big juicy blackberries on Farm Charm

One morning I went out and collected about 6 cups of blackberries in about 10 minutes.

Swallowtail butterfly enjoying the Farm Charm blackberries

I have been reading up on canning from various other bloggers (Preparedness Mama and The Organic Prepper), and on this National Center for Home Food Preservation. I’ll share how I made two cans of blackberry jam in about 45 minutes soon.

Bye Bye Bunny Buffet

For the past couple weeks, every few days I was going out to the garden each evening and letting my four year old pick 1-2 juicy red strawberries to enjoy. We’d see them ripen from whitish to light pink to deep red and it was really fun to anticipate when we would get to pick them. Remember we only have four little strawberry plants so I don’t think we’ll ever have a bowlful of strawberries to eat at once.

Then I noticed the strawberry production stop. I’m out in the garden each evening after work and would see that a berry was misshapen, had a chunk missing, or had disappeared altogether. Once I saw the strawberry stumps, I knew it was a critter at work. Prior to that, I was just thinking this is what happens when you grow organic, they don’t look so pretty.

Farm Charm strawberry stump after bunny munching — What was left of a juicy red strawberry

I immediately thought it must be Bunnies! I guess birds would eat berries too, and certainly other animals like groundhogs and mice. But I had recently watched the CGI version of Peter Rabbit (hilarious btw, I heart James Corden!) and thought it made sense. Plus, I never told you about this, but when I was turning the soil back in March to get the garden ready for planting, I found two dead baby bunnies in one of the beds. I was so sad for them and thought that would be a morbid post for a blog.

With my detective badge and notepad handy, I didn’t think it was too impossible to conclude that if they had been nesting in the garden, they were also probably dining in the garden. Nothing against these little furry Easter icons, but I wanted to find a way to ever so gently suggest they do their munching elsewhere. I did some googling for how to deter bunnies and needed a solution that blocked them from the plants whilst not blocking me. Initially I thought I’d put up a 2-3’ wooden stake in each corner and then wrap some mesh netting around the whole raised bed. But then I’d have to bend over all awkwardly to get to the plants myself. Nah.

Instead I had the idea to use some of the tomato cages that were in the shed. We had some left over netting too. I laid the netting out in the grass, folded it once lengthwise so that it was doubled over, and then laid the tomato cage on top of the netting. Cactus helped me with this because it a job for more than two hands. He rolled the cage and netting together until the netting covered the whole thing and overlapped a few inches. He held the netting firmly around the cage while I cut it and then we secured it with a chip clip. It doesn’t get more DIY than this I don’t think.

Farm Charm tomato cages wrapped in netting — My DIY bunny deterrents – tomato cages wrapped in netting

Now we’ll have to wait a few days and see if this does the trick so that we can say Bye Bye to the Bunny Buffet. I’ll keep you posted.

Getting my garden on

Finally jumping in to the dirt

Starting seeds

One of the things I am most excited to be able to do now that we have a bigger yard is garden. Previously, living in a town home, I would say I dabbled in gardening. I’ve read dozens of articles on container gardening and truly believe it’s possible to have quite a fruitful output with window boxes and pots or whatever you can construct out of a pallet, but that never happened for me. The plants would grow, mostly tomatoes and lettuce and a few peppers, but after picking a few fruits or veggies that was pretty much the end of my harvest. Squirrels and bunnies seemed to have a hay day with my efforts and those were the only creatures who benefited.

So now, I’m hoping to make a much more valiant effort and see a slightly more gratifying result. For the past few weeks I saved seeds from some of the typical veggies we love to eat: red and orange bell peppers, jalapenos, and butternut squash. I let the seeds dry on a plate for about a week and then I filled two egg cartons with dirt from the garden and dropped a couple seeds into each egg holder spot (probably not the correct term). If I recall correctly from when I bought seeds at Home Depot or Lowes, something would start to sprout within 2-3 weeks. I’m hopeful at least a few of them will grow but in case that doesn’t happen, I wanted to start early so I could try again (and again, and again).

For me, that’s a huge part of the beauty of this place. It’s “wide open spaces, room to make the big mistakes” as the oh-so-wise Dixie Chicks once said (and yes, I’ve referenced them twice back to back). While I do not consider attempting to start some veggie plants from seeds and failing a big mistake, it feels so freeing to even have the option now. If this doesn’t work out, I’m sure there are approximately 147,000 blog posts on how to grow plants from seeds that I could read and learn from, like this on The Spruce. But naively, I wanted to just attempt it from the simplest most basic logic that came to my mind:

“This piece of [cucumber] I’m eating has seeds.
Seeds are what you plant to grow the [cucumber].
I wonder what would happen if I just toss some of these seeds in a little bit of earth?”

I’m not convinced that I have to buy some kit that costs $59.99 to start seeds. That just sounds like crazy talk. Full disclaimer: a few years back I asked Cactus Man (aka my husband) to buy me one of those fish tanks that grows herbs on top and he did. Guess how many herbs I successfully grew? Pick a number between 0 and 0 and you’ll be correct.

And of course if the seed thing doesn’t work out this season, I can always buy some starter plants from a local nursery. Not gonna be a purist who insists on growing everything from scratch. Plus, I foresee there being lots of other points along the way where I can very realistically mess this up. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not predicting failure before I even start. I’m just recognizing that I could very well get the starter plants off the ground indoors and then plant them outdoors only to have 27 other curve balls come at me, like weather, and animals, and the soil’s composition, that I wasn’t prepared for.

But in the meantime, I’m really eager to think about the bounty that we could have all summer long right from our own backyard. Here’s what I think I want to start with this first year:

Lettuce – red leaf and romaine
Kale
Tomatoes – heirloom and cherry and whatever is good for canning
Spicy peppers – jalapeno, habanero
Bell peppers
Butternut squash
Strawberries
Blueberries

Biting off more than I can chew? (couldn’t resist!) Maybe, but I’ve heard all of these are pretty standard/hearty plants for beginners. So I’ll keep you posted.

Primary Menu

Category: Garden