Friday, April 17, 2009

How Does Your Garden Grow?

One of the gifts I received for my birthday back in March, was a set of seeds and planters given to me by one of my oldest and dearest friends - Debbie. (Not to say that SHE is one of my "OLDEST" friends- just that she has been my friend for a VERY long time... I guess it would be more politically correct just to say BFF :-)
( can members of the 40+ crowd use BFF without looking silly?)
Anyway, I have always been more of a flower garden person than the vegetable garden type. We do have 2 blueberry bushes, some strawberry plants, and we usually buy a few cherry tomato plants in the spring- but that has been the extent of my ventures into edible gardening.
Debbie saw fit to rectify this fact, being aware of
-what the food bill is for a family of 7,
-that there have been several recalls of contaminated produce,
-the fact that everything tastes better fresh from the garden, and
-that often children will eat better if they have picked the food themselves.
Anyway, Will and I started some of the seeds indoors a few weeks ago.
My first attempts- cherry tomatoes, lettuce and sweet bell peppers.
Notice anything?? I have some hope for the cherry tomatoes and the peppers, but the lettuce?




I separated out some of the lettuce seedlings- I put them outside on warm , sunny days to harden them). They are in good potting soil (with miracle grow). But so far I am less than optimistic that we will be harvesting any lettuce. Any ideas? Next, I will try some sugar snap peas and some zucchini. And when we are finally past the risk of frost (we had frost AGAIN this morning :-( I guess I will try to direct sow some of the lettuce seeds I have left.

Or perhaps I should stick to flowers

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Your flower looks good enough to eat, you know almost like a pastry flower :)
I have no luck with any plant, so be thankful you can at least grow pretty flowers!

Aragon greyhounds said...

Gorgeous camellia-is that Debutante? I would keep trying with the vegetables. I have a friend in Keswick Va that has tons of heirloom tomatoes if you want to try your hand at some additional veggies...and oh by the way she has greyhounds also
Helen

Alex said...

Hi Helen,
I'm so glad you dropped by my blog!
I believe that Greer Gardens called it "Pink Perfection"
I ordered it through the mail after falling in love with a similar camellia at the Elizabethan Gardens in Manteo N.C.
I have had it three years and it is still only about 3 feet tall. I don't get loads of blooms from it, but the ones I do get, I really love!
My friend Debbie did give me a pack of "orange banana" tomato seeds from Baker Creek Heirloom seeds as well. I will try them as well.

GreytGold said...

I would be cautious with tomatoes - not because they are not good for the dogs, but I've found that Drew will pick them all off of the bush and eat them just before they are ripe and then this is none left for us. Our bushes were so big he could stand behind them picking and eating and we wouldn't see him. Such a Sneak!
Lisa