Our Garden is In

It's such a good feeling to be able to say that. I've been "gardening" since I could walk and the promise contained in a handful of seeds, dirt, sunshine and water is as much of a thrill to me as it was when I was 5 years old.

Gardening is an awful lot like life. Every year you learn more about what works, what doesn't work and develop ideas of new things you would like to try. Trust me on this, my mom has been gardening for over 50 years and she is still trying new things!

Last year was our first year using black plastic to cut down on the weeding. It surely did that, for which we are very, very, very grateful :) But, we realized that it also created some problems with water run off and pooling. Basically the water went everywhere but where it needed to go -- the roots. We started planning how to do things better this year.

What's New In the Garden

Early this last week George created a tool that would make a furrow, mounted it to his tractor and plowed a deep furrow for every row. We then laid down the black plastic so it dipped down into each furrow. All of our seeds and plants went into these furrows. Then we laid a length of soaker hose in each furrow and tried out our idea. So far it's working quite well. We're not getting much evaporation and each little cutout where the seeds and plants are is getting nice and moist.

A lot of new gardeners feel intimidated because they think they have to plant 25 varieties of vegetables to "qualify" as a gardener. Not so! I'm a big believer in only planting only the things we know we like, and one or two new items to try out.

Here's what we've planted for this year

Sweet Corn
Beets
Bibb Lettuce
Tomatoes
Bell Peppers
Jalapeno Peppers
Carrots
Cantaloupe
Butternut Squash
Sweet Yellow Onions
Green Onions
Peas