Littlest Gardener

Virginia hanging out (for the third time in a day) in her pool, watering the amaranth. She's actually pretty helpful -- doesn't pull out weeds or non-weeds. She's a keeper.

Underway

The spring has, at last, settled in. AMEN.

Well, because of Ms. Virginia's arrival, gardening isn't the same leisurely activity that it once was. Even getting the seeds started is something of a race against time--not so much against the warming temperatures, but against the astonishing backlog of household chores and necessities. The taxes must be calculated, the leaves raked, and the clothes sent off to Goodwill.

The tomatoes, however, have been hatched, and all but one of the pods is boasting fresh life. We're ten days away from the time we planted the seeds, and they seem to be doing well. The secondary leaves are just beginning show, though the stems seem a little on the leggy side. In another week or two, we'll start one of my least favorite process: the Thinning.


The Thinning. There comes a point where only one plant is allowed in each pod. You (well, I--Camille always seems to be busy) have to go in with a pair of scissors and snip away at the weaker plant. As someone who has never been tall, I always have a tough time with this, and I inevitably allow one or two of the smaller guys to prevail.

Anyway, this is where we are in our planting. A lot of the other seeds are going to be planted directly in the ground.

Garlic Discoveries

So this was fun: I entered a garlic recipe contest sponsored by NPR. My recipe for crab cakes was chosen in the top three, and they featured the recipe on the site.

After listening to the original program, I assumed that all the recipes had to have green garlic, which I'd never used before. I'd put scapes into my crabcakes, so I thought they might work. Serendipitous to the entry, I found a whole patch of green garlic in last year's site! So now we don't worry about "wasting" our precious crop.

Our regular garlic has done fabulously this year -- it's already four inches high. This morning I put compost all around the plants and then planted lettuce in between.

Beets go in today too. It's a gorgeous sunny cool day -- and we have a kite to fly later today!

Horse, Of Course

The top photo is the organic horse manure compost we bought from a local(ish) farmer. It's chunky, but smells great (meaning has very little horse smell). The bottom photo is the compost after we ran the rototiller through it. We changed farmers this year because the stuff last year was pretty woody -- although, admittedly, it did work great.

back on track!

We're back on track with gardening. Our seeds came in late, but we weren't quite ready to plant anyway. David's paint-dot system might actually keep us organized (or, at least, keep track of which tomatoes are which). Our young friend Jonathan helped up plant this year, and he did a terrific job -- and learned a little bit about math!

Virginia will be "helping," no doubt, and we're planning lots of vegetables around her -- and around the (YAY!) deep freezer we got from craigslist.

Helping Hands

Oh, Miss V. has really taken to gardening (with some breaks for sliding, of course).

I hope horse manure compost isn't bad for toddlers. She ate a little. Maybe it'll build her immunity? Farm kids are supposed to be healthier and anti-bacterial-slathered-kids because of their early exposure to a variety of microbes.

Let's hope.

Marriage & Compromise

David's been patient with me these last four years. I can get a little too ambitious with garden plans ("Let's grow 17 different types of yellow tomatoes and have a huge tasting contest with the neighbors!"), which is fine (and, he admits, exciting to a degree), but I don't have the organizational skills to implement consistently my grandiose plans.

So we'll have the 17 tomato plants, but I'll lose all the little stick label-things marking the pots, and we have to plant them willy-nilly and guess at their names. Or we'll have nine bean plants but I'll get occupied and forget to cook them for a week and they'll have to be thrown out. Or we'll plant them so close that everything gets contaminated with some claustrophobic mold.

I also like to give away our bounty to friends, but he's the one weeding and picking suckers and mowing, mostly, so he gets the grunt work and -- because I am the one handing out the results or cooking them -- I get more of the glory.

I rarely admit my (best-laid) plans gang aft algey, but he knows he's right.

But here, publicly, on this here blog, I will capitulate to his sober and sensible plans, forswearing my intractable imagination, and will choose fewer varieties, work with more precision and attention, and plant the seedlings a little farther apart.

But...um, I'll claim a little spot down in the way-back-yard for my "experimental garden."

Signed, digitally,
Camille Napier Bernstein
(stubborn to the last)

Back from the Compost Heap

One of my favorite photos

So wait, you're telling me that we haven't updated our blog in nearly a year? And that we didn't make one crummy posting during ALL of last year's garden.
"That's unacceptable!"

Well, I agree. I will say that we DID have a garden last year, though it did not receive the love and attention that past gardens had enjoyed. I blame Virginia and a protracted job search. One of the distractions was significantly more enjoyable than the other. We did, however, cultivate a garden in the summer of 2008, and I am willing to call it a moderate success. Our tomatoes thrived, our garlic was weak, and everything else in between did pretty OK. I'll take it!

Camille and I (and Virginia, of course) are back, searching through piles of organic seed catalogs, trying to figure out what we want. I am determined, after years of feeble protest, to push my agenda for a smaller, more orderly garden, this year. Frankly, even without VA, Camille and I have been overwhelmed by gardens past. Once the heat hits, there's just too much to do, and a lot of the doing never gets done. As a result, the zucchinis aren't harvested on time (they turn woody), the carrots aren't thinned (creating strange mutations due to lack of nutrients), and tomato suckers aren't pinched off (which leads to more tomatoes...that are lacking in serious glucose, or whatever). So this year, with four gardens under our belt, I say...downsize. A little.

We really are excited this year though. Life won't be so crazy, and Virginia will be able to toddle around, digging up worms and eating fresh fruits. It's going to be GREAT. I am most looking forward to growing tomatoes and eggplant (so pretty) and peppers for Camille. I am also excited to plant a few flower varieties, but that's mostly so I can take photos of them.

Okay, we're back!