Gardening

I am the worlds’ worst gardener.  I actually have a black thumb as opposed to a green thumb. My father on the other hand is a very talented gardener.  We grew up with fresh fruit and vegetables every summer.  Of course, I didn’t realize how wonderful it was until I moved to California and was no longer able to enjoy the wonderful crops.  Dad grew cucumbers, tomatoes, asparagus, blueberries, potatoes, lettuce, watermelon, cantaloupe, squash, zucchini, radishes (yuck), peas (double yuck), corn (not in several years), pumpkins, black eyed peas, and raspberries (new, I haven’t been able to have them).  He also grew lots of beautiful flowers. I am pretty sure I am forgetting something. 

Matt and I have talked about having a garden for several years.  In Pax River, his house had the perfect area that was already tilled and ready for planting.  Of course, we never planted anything.  In California, we lived in a community that had a HOA so our land was common area.  We couldn’t really plant anything but we focused on rosemary.  Matt actually brought the rosemary from Hash House A Go Go (they give you really big sprigs as a garnish) and was able to make it grow.  Unfortunately, we had to leave the plant when we moved.  Since we moved here, Matt has become more determined to actually start a garden. 

After several weekends of talking about it, shopping for supplies, we finally decided to start our new hobby (seriously, a new hobby with a 7 month old, what are we thinking).  We spent the entire day weeding the area which would hopefully become our garden.  This was a difficult task because our yard has been pretty much been overtaken by weeds.  After several hours of weeding, it was getting dark and we were not finished.  I decided to plant some of the seeds in the planter to give us a head start.

This was my first time ever mowing the lawn.  I am SUPER excited about my manual mower.  Although, I am glad we don't have a huge yard and no "real" grass!

Of course since we didn’t finish the first weekend, we were worried that it would never.  Ideally, I would finish weeding during the week but realistically I have a seven month old.  Surprisingly, I was able to weed for about a hour every day but did not finish.  So guess what our plans were the next weekend??  Gardening!

Lucy was really excited to be able to help with a family project!

We finished weeding the garden and then it was time to plant!  Of course, that is not as easy as you would think.  All of our seeds, fertilizers, and soil were all in Italian so we had to translate the packages first.  Second issue, we had a small garden and lots of things we wanted to plant.  We wanted to plant tomatoes, zucchini, onions, peppers, and cucumbers.  Who knew that plants needed to be a certain distance between plants and rows??  And did you know that squash and cucumber take up a lot of space? 

Roses-we don't get credit for these but they sure are beautiful!

After probably two hours of planning, we finally figured out the plan of our garden!  We started with onion, then tomato, peppers, cucumber, and then squash.  Each row has between 2-3 plants.  I was a little sad that we won’t have more quantity, I mean only two cucumber and two squash plants?! 

Now we are in the waiting game.  I am optimistic even though I have the black thumb. But, we have some growth in our planters! 

GROWTH!! Hopefully, it will produce lots of vegetables and fruit!