This year I have tomatoes, zucchini, cilantro, and mixed greens growing, and I JUST started some pumpkins as well. One thing I learned from last year was fewer was better and to thin out the plants, since I’m doing container gardening. As soon as I did that my plants starting taking off. The zucchini have tons of blossoms AND I was very happy to share my started plants with many people so far.
We’ve been harvesting and using the greens and cilantro for quite a while. Last year I grew all sorts of salad greens and I really couldn’t stand to eat any of it because it was all too bitter. This year I bought greens that said they were heat resistant. Cutting some from the pot and taking a bite I was sad to taste that it still seemed bitter, but I brought it in and thoroughly rinsed it. I don’t know if it is because they are a heat resistant or because of the thorough rinsing, but added to salads they don’t taste bitter at all.
And thanks to the garden we’ve had some delicious salads so far. I’m looking forward to zucchini bread and yummy tomatoes later this summer.
Hello! Just thought I’d drop in to share a little inspiration.
Here are a few new-to-me inspo blogs. I’m not sure where I found them all, but hey, let’s face it, they probably all came through Mim some way or another. She seems to be on the pulse of all awesomeosity that is the world wide interblogosphere.
Run With Scissors, Art Equals Happy, Art & Musings, liisforlovely, and this flickr group for all the people taking the Tell Your Story online class through Red Velvet Art.
Here is a repeating grass pattern I’ve been working on while at work. I made it using this same pattern making technique roughly, only I did it all on the computer in photoshop. Layer by layer, believe it or not. I’m thinking of repeating the pattern a few times and having it printed at spoonflower. If you are into patterns, its worth a trip over to spoonflower just to peruse the other patterns customers have submitted and had printed. So inspiring!
It’s spring time and that means garden time. Here is my container dirt garden. Every day I water my dirt. Hopefully someday soon I might actually have some plants. That would be nice. Did you hear that gardening guru Gayla Trail has a new book out? I need to get this.
And last but not least . . . my nephew is smiling so much now. It’s not the greatest picture (ancient camera phone) but the cute still translates.
I think this tomato has a date with some fresh mozzarella for a caprese salad in my tummy very soon.
This snap pea needs some friends. When I started planting seeds for all of my garden plants this spring I said I would be happy and it would be a success if I got just ONE single zucchini, tomato, pumpkin, pea pod, etc.). I think my garden is kind of holding me to that.
Here is a pumpkin, isn’t it cute? And next to it, the world’s oldest cell phone still in use, isn’t it sad?
Now, I’m off to the porch swing where I will be working on my latest yoyo project.
So my container garden is growing splendidly.
I only have the two tomatoes still and they are just starting to head towards orange. My lettuce, well, they look like lettuce. They taste like poison, but they look like lettuce. My sister in law warned me about this, apparently they get bitter once it gets warm. Note taken. My zucchini is looking and tasting like zucchini. In a proud triumph, I made zucchini bread from my own hand grown zucchini (grown from seed, mind you) and it tasted yumm, to umm. Lastly, pictured above…it is what I assume to be one of my first potential pumpkins. They are vining out of their containers and onto the patio.
My hibiscus has been blooming like crazy for the last month as well. It just rained when I went out to take these pictures so everything is a bit dewy looking.
And because I love dying hibiscus just about as much as I love blooming hibiscus, here is this beauty for you.
And, if you love the wilting hibiscus blossom as much as I do, you might like a copy of this image hanging in your home, available in my etsy shop.
I just hobbled out to water my plants and was surprised to see I’ve got two little tomatoes growing. I squealed when I saw “a”, which is probably the diameter of a dime (if even) and then shocked when I saw “B” (probably the size of a half dollar) because ‘How had I not seen this big ol’ tomato yet?!?!’.
For my first container garden I said I’d be pleased if I got one fruit or vegetable off of each variety of plant I grew. As I only had one tomato plant, that seemed reasonable. Then I thought “oh no, do tomatoes self pollinate or will I have a fruitless plant because I only had one?” but it worked. Multiple tomatoes off of one plant (so far).
My mom told me, since I’m enjoying my container garden so much this year, that if I wanted, I could till up a section in their old garden (which has just become one with the rest of their lawn) and have a garden there. I think I might take her up on that. I have dreams of making a little fenced in garden area, like my grandma used to keep, where things are all planned out and have their places. I’m learning a lot about that after seeding and planting so many in just the containers this year.
I’m excited for Tomato a and Tomato B and the rest of the gang to develop and ripen.
I’m sure they will all be delicious. Is that disturbing? Naming and then eating your produce? I promise not to get too attached :D
Hey everyone! Sorry I’ve been gone so long. I’m in the midst of the slow move from my apartment to the new place. I was slammed with the flu earlier this week which put a damper on moving much this week. Lastly, my desktop is still sitting on the living room floor so I am somewhat limited to computer access. Last night we brought Theo, my rabbit, over and she seems to be adjusting better than I could have ever hoped. She has been less timid than she was in my apartment and very eager to come out and play.
Searching through flickr at handspun yarns I came upon a flickr for Liz (pocket farmer) and was instantly smitten. She spins, and farms, and gardens and seems to live such an ideal life to me. I would almost go so far as to say, she is living the life that I always dreamed would be mine, as I grew up.
Seeing her images and reading her words has me even more pumped up about gardening. A post on her old blog got me thinking about how when I was young my family used to garden every year. To me it was just something you do, every year you garden and grow your own vegetables. This may not be right, but in my memory, as we (the kids) got older and my mom went back to work, we gardened less and less until no garden at all, yet I still have this idea in my head that gardening is an important part of life. Maybe gardening was just a phase my parents went through, but it just happened to fall in such an important part of my life.
When my sister and I took a road trip years ago we stopped at Lehman’s Non Electric, a store in Amish country devoted to all things…you may have guessed it, Non Electric. There, we picked up this wonderful book by Readers Digest Back to Basics and it just seemed full of exactly all the things that my parents were interested in while I was growing up, doing things for yourself the traditional way.
As an adult living in a location where there was no plot of land, not even a windowsill to place a container, it was always a regret that I couldn’t garden and just enjoy the outdoors in that manner. So now, I’ve found myself in a place that doesn’t really have space for a garden, but I do have a patio and have high hopes for some container gardening. Matt sent me this link earlier this week, how to build a square foot garden.
Last but not least, I would like to send out a thank you to my friend Sheila for sending me this wonderful easter package. I love this little bunny she sent me after I noted that it looked like Theo. Also, love, love, love the idea she had to make her thank you notes on a library card, brilliant!
