I'm in the Garden...

I’m in the garden... you will find this statement splashed on a piece of old barn board on my porch, to let visitors know where they can find me if my car is in the driveway but I am nowhere to be found!

Dressed with hanging baskets and a red 1950’s vintage style metal lawn chair and surrounded by growing sunflowers, we create an experimental garden project each year.  I say experimental in loose terms.  For the most part, we do know what we are doing when we strategically plop those seeds in the ground annually, but we always introduce something new, not always knowing the potential result.  Each year slightly different outcomes – some good and some bad!  We have made a few garden mistakes, but each year we learn a little more and each year something grows, and something is better than nothing at all!

I grabbed my first handful of cilantro the other night and sprinkled it across my chicken and veggie alfredo.  Allan always turns his nose up to “little green leaves,” but I still put it on his plate and to my surprise he eats it every time.  However, rather than enjoying it with the meal he scarfs it down first, then takes pleasure in eating whatever else is on his plate.  Radishes have been speedily growing, as they always do.  We have already eaten a whole row and more are nearly ready to be plucked out and chopped into salads.   

It feels great running out to the garden to grab our own veggies.  Soon enough I will be able to make complete meals using vegetables straight from the garden.  Last year, we often made whole meals using all our own meat and vegetables: a salad with lettuce, peppers, onions, parsley, cucumber, carrots and tomatoes; boiled potatoes and cabbage; our hamburger sautéed with onions and most often omelettes with our own eggs, mixed with chopped veggies and feta.  No, we did not make the feta!    

Often, Allan plants more than me in the spring, but then I spend the rest of the season maintaining the flower beds and weeding and watering the vegetable garden.  Luckily this year it has rained steadily, making my job a little easier, but I do complain when we have no rain for a week straight.  We share the outdoor duties, but often I would rather be feeding the animals than weeding the garden, although there is a relaxing and healthy nature to it all.    

I am glad no one but the dogs are usually present when I see the first sprout of each plant pop out of the soil.  Excited is an understatement.  It is such a miracle to me, year after year, to see those seeds sprout into huge vegetable plants.  August and September always bring us the most wonderful produce and every day progress is being made in the dirt!   

We have added meat birds to our list of critters this year, which will taste mighty fine with steamed veggies!  Roasted chicken with potatoes anyone? 

“A garden is a grand teacher.  It teaches patience and careful watchfulness; it teaches industry and thrift; above all it teaches entire trust.”

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