How does your garden grow?
It grows ok. My maiden voyage into the world of gardening is not one that is exciting. It’s about as heart-palpitating as watching tomatoes grow. In fact, it’s exactly like that.
My grandfather always had a garden – still does. And he grows these tomatoes that are as big as a newborns head. I would not want to birth one of those bad boys…on a less disgusting visual note, they are delicious. Big, juicy, full of flavor. Just the thought has me jonesing for a tomato sandwich. with just a smidge of mayo and a little salt and pepper. ooooh….it’s like if Brangelina’s baby married the offspring of Posh & Mr. McUnderwears…and their baby, affectionately named Awesome, was raised by Mother Theresa and P.Diddy…that’s how amazing they are. Pappap must have a secret.
Anyhoo…so ever since I was little, I would love to go out there and pretend the garden was mine. And then this year, we actually have enough space to set aside plots for a garden.
I decided that I would handle raised beds and I chose to have it on the front side yard because 1. it has good drainage and gets full sun and 2. because it puts me closer to our neighbors grape bushes and they said we could eat as many as we could want…and you know with me and free stuff…moth & flame…and 3. because it is closer to the front door and I would like to burn as least number of calories as possible…aka I’m lazy like that.
Now for the fun part…watching Jeremy dig.
I could watch that man in those jeans all.day.long. Insert some kinda gutteral noise here. numerous times.
Jer Bear showed me this technique to pull the grass out. I literally called him a genius three times for this. It doesn’t take much to impress me.
Basically all you do is take short jabs right under the grass…really close together…and then just peel the grass back. It’s genius I tell ya. GENIUS.
After all the oogling…I mean, digging was done, my darling boyfriend made sure the plot was big enough for the bed.
Then he dragged some free wood from the burn pile next door (I know…free wood and free grapes…I live in luxury!) to frame out the garden entirely.
After the frame was in, we mixed in some new soil and I put my little plants in the ground. I did two types of tomatoes, red, green, and yellow peppers, jalapenos, squash, cucumbers, rosemary and basil.
I was so proud just to get the stuff in the ground. I honestly didn’t know if they would even survive. And then I realized we had a couple problems. The first was critters…namely Will. Of course deer would probably eat everything Will tore outta the ground…so I knew we needed some kinda fence.
I also realized that my bed was too big for my britches….as in too many plants, not enough space.
So Jeremy had to do some more digging. in those jeans. darn 🙂
and then the next day, he put up a fence around the whole thing.
I also took the time to move some of the plants over to the other plot. And there you have it – our garden.
About a month later, we actually saw some notable growth. Everything seemed to be going well until the summer really hit hard. And I told you that we live in the valley of the shadow of drought…it’s true. No rains. So my little garden suffered some losses.
Now it looks like this. The squash and cucumbers totally died off. Everything else is alright…including my weeds…which look like they are ready for harvesting 🙂
I have enjoyed the fresh tomatoes and herbs though…
The little tomatoes line my kitchen window sill waiting for me to check for readiness. And these are tiny little boogers – supposed to be roma tomotoes – but they look more like big squished cherry tomotoes…must have been due to the lack of rain.
But I don’t mind the size – especially when they taste so good on everything.
So how’s your garden growing? Oh and a question for the more experienced gardener…is there something I should be planting now? I am new here, ya know. Oh heck…maybe I should just call Pappap 🙂
Hi Katie! I’m new to your blog and I love seeing what you’re getting into each day. I planted my very first garden this year too! My dad brought his tiller up to my house and tilled the ground, so we didn’t have to go through the step of pulling up the grass. My garden did really well for a while, but now it’s dying 🙁 One thing I noticed with mine was bugs! I planted cabbage (which was really cool to grow btw) but before I could pick it, the bugs litterally ate the whole thing! Next year I’ll have to research some safe pesticides. I actually took some pics of mine about a month ago, you can see them here http://lifeonagravelroad.blogspot.com/2011/07/you-are-what-you-eat.html
Keep up the good work! 🙂
Love the trick about the grass! Our landlord has a garden in the backyard but it’s sort of a hot mess (plants everywhere- no organization). We do love having fresh basil though!
Good for you for trying out a garden!! I always say I’m going to start one but chicken out. I’m still working on trying to not kill my other plants & flowers.
I have failed at a garden this year. And I shouldn’t say it was a garden-it was a few containers. The bugs got to my squash 🙁 and my husband poked fun at me the whole summer but I tried two different times with the squash. I do have a few peppers, basil, and parsley. I also want to know what I could be planting now. Thanks for the photos of your garden-it has inspired me for next year has I would like to have my father-in-law build me something.
The tomato and Basil look delish! We’ve talked about a garden for 3 years now, and decided that we are going to dig up the ground and get it ready this fall… then next spring there will be no excuses =) The boytoy did a great job!
This is our first year with a yard and therefore our first with a vegetable garden. We started small too – tomatoes, radishes, cucumbers, and a bunch of herbs like basil, rosemary, thyme, and dill. Other gardeners told me I could plant fall crops like broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and squash in mid-summer, so I planted some a week or two ago. The cabbage looks depressed, but the broccoli is getting bigger fast. I probably jinxed myself by typing that. Since the seedlings were only 45 cents apiece from the farm stand, it’s at least no great loss if they give up the ghost.
I tried my darnest to grow herbs this year, but they all died! I think the sun was too hot and scorched the heck out of them. Also, they turned into weeds. Cry! Better luck next year 😉
You are so lucky to have a yard to plant a garden in! My Hubby and I helped his out-of town coworker by watering her garden plot. As a bonus we got to keep everything we picked. It was so wonderful to have fresh cherry tomatoes, bell peppers, and herbs. was the best two weeks ever!
I am in Texas so I understand the valley of drought feeling:(. My tomatoes (yellow, cherry, beef steak) are putzing along thanks to me watering (which is totally not free!) daily. I am hoping my efforts will pay off once the temps are longer in the triple digits.
On the other hand, my basil and mint are doing quite well. I have the mint contained so not to take over the garden (like my basil did since I, too, am too lazy (and was also ignorant) to pinch the flowers off in time for the past 2 years.) Pesto anyone?!
Very cool little garden you got there!
So…I could be a teeny bit jealous that you have a good looking man to do all the ‘grunt’ work for you 🙂 – I had to do mine all by myself 🙁
I am SO borrowing that trick for getting up grass!!!
I think your garden looks great, especially for your first go round.
Roma’s are an elongated cooking tomato, but they are delicious no matter how you serve them. Yours look just fine.
The garden looks great! Here’s a helpful planting calendar: http://www.georgiaorganics.org/Calendars/plantingcalendar.pdf
One tip for harvesting basil. As soon as it starts to go to seed (when the little white flowers pop up), cut the basil all the way down to just above the bottom leaves. Within a couple of weeks, your basil will grow back twofold. You should harvest it like this a couple of times during the summer. Lots of pesto, for sure!
I grew a garden this year as well, and most everything is dying out except for a few tomatoes left. I think you can plant turnips now (if you’re into that sort of thing).
This is my fourth year with a garden and as is every year once the sun comes out full force the plants go away. Tomatoes and squash/cukes/zuccs need lots and lots of water. Basically if not twice a day they will die off. However, herbs can withstand the heat and the cold. Especially in GA, you should be able to grow your oregano, sage, rosemary and other harty herbs through the winter without taking them inside. However basil, cilantro and parsley need to be taking inside during the winter to survive. Good luck, it’s a blast!
We had a garden last year, did alright. This year with the landscaping craziness we didn’t put one up and I’m not sure I ever will again because it takes so much water. Which reminds me, you mentioned lack of rain, why not water the garden? Here in the summer if we don’t get enough rain the plants will just wilt before you can get home and water them again, big water suckage and total pain 🙁 Makes me sad though because I wanted corn, squash, cucs, peppers, all that. Bum city.
This was our first summer with a big garden, and it did okay. Our squash all seemed to have a meltdown about 3 weeks ago and died off. Our tomatoes took forever to ripen, and then the plants started dying (methinks it’s due to lack of space and watering the leaves too much). Our cukes are insane though – pickling, pickling, pickling! Our herbs and peppers (hot and sweet bell) have performed about as well too. We’re planning on almost tripling our garden’s size next year, and I can’t wait!
If you’re a fan of garlic, now (or September) would be a great time to plant some. Don’t use the heads that you get out of the grocery store though – they’ve typically been genetically modified to rot instead of sprout. You just leave them in the ground all winter, and you’ll have a great harvest next fall. I know…patience. 🙂
Ha! I saw your man-meat doing his yard work and thought “hot-diggity, I need to see more of him”. Don’t tell my husband ok? I could care less about your garden after that post… 🙂
Giiirllll, I could watch him dig all day in those jeans too!
Gotta say, Katie…Jeremy’s kinda sorta HAWT! Lucky girl!!!
I built raised beds this year too, my first garden – everything turned out great! Except my basil got eaten alive by these gross bugs. 🙁 I want to plant pumpkins really bad for Halloween, but I’m afraid – everyone says they go crazy and take up a lot of space!
Lovely garden! I had a good one last year. This year I tried to start everything from seed. It started out well, but now it’s late August and no tomatoes yet. I live south of Atlanta on the state line, so I bed the lack of rain hasn’t helped. My herbs died a quick death from a weed wacker. Will try again next year.
That’s awesome! My cucumbers and zucchini died a noble death, too. This was my first year of gardening. You fenced area looks great!
This is my second year gardening and I decided to expand my selection. It did so well last year, but this year my tomatoes and cucumbers are dying from the heat. Last year they went through to October! Oh well. This year I tried growing cabbage, brussel sprouts, carrots, sweet potatoes, and celery for something new. From what i have read, you could be planting some leafy greens, like kale and even broccoli and cabbage would grow through the fall, especially since it is in Georgia! I feeling is that we will get better each year we grow a garden so keep it up!
Good job! We’re on the same track. Gardening reminds me of my grandparents, and I miss them so much! We planted our first garden in a raised bed planter using the plans from Ana White. We waaay overfilled our space, but left it like that. Hoping to have a second bed next year. We planted 3 tomatoes, cucumber, green beans and yellow beans, basil, green onion, and green peppers.
The tomatoes, basil, and cucumber have done great. The rest, notsomuch. Our tomatoes were small too (but tons of them and oh SO DELICIOUS), and my hubby also thinks it’s the heat and lack of rain.
xo
Yum! The things I would do to that boy! And girlfriend, those jeans! I mean, he’s wearing jeans. I am all hot and bothered thinking about him in jeans. Jeans!!!!
I mostly missed the garden boat this year. Apparently you have to plant in March here in Texas to avoid the summer heat (47/last 55 days above 100… yikes!). Being a native Hoosier (that’s Indiana), we’re still shoveling the last of the snows in March.
I did manage to get a basil plant and four tomatoes out in May, but thanks to one of the hottest, driest summers on record in Dallas (and our new puppy who loves to dig up tomato plants), the tomatoes don’t look so hot. The basil on the other hand is going like gangbusters.
Love the raised beds! I think we’re going to try those next year!
I feel your pain… sort of… I have a black thumb. There is one plant I have managed to keep alive for a few years, on my desk at work, an ivy plant. Because it’s there, in my face, 5 days a week, I remember to water it. (Usually.)
At home? Not so much.
Thank goodness for hubby dearest who has a green thumb and actually enjoys getting down and dirty in the garden. Planting things, people, planting things!
We had our garden in the back of our yard for 15 years and just this year, for some reason known only to God, hubby thought to move the garden to the side of our house which gets full sun.
The little raised plot is about 12′ long by about 4″ wide and he planted: grape tomatoes, red cabbage (no idea why), broccoli, cucumbers, eggplant, basil, garlic, onions, scallions, parsley, and potatoes.
Might I share this with you? 4 broccoli plants and 4 cabbage plants take up a LOT of space. Those leaves are monstrous! And the tomatoes? They took over the garden! I must have gotten thousands! And our cucumbers are not less than 12″ long; some are 15″ long and Lord knows how big around! And I spent 3 weekends cooking eggplant. And we are sharing tomatoes and cucumbers and basil and parsley with anyone who will unwittingly take a bag of fresh produce from us when we yell, “Tag, you’re it!” and run away!
We MUST cut back what we plant next year. There are only two of us!!!
I’ve been lookin through your archives! Has anyone ever said your Mom looks like Paula Dean?? 🙂
I got an organic tomato plant from Costco from my parents and never took it out of the pot it came in. I got tomatoes before anyone else, but man I can’t keep the plant alive for the life of me. Eventhough it appears totally dead, it still pumps out some red tomatoes and they are delicious! I need to plan better next year!
I love your blog. Will is so adorable. You inspired me to visit the Good Will for the first time ever, I believe!
In the summer it helps greatly if you water them. It is a ritual for me to water my garden every evening. And if laziness or busyness is an issue you can water them every other day and just make sure the water gets to the roots. Hey! If you go a little greener… and start composting your food scraps…. you could turn the compost into kick ass soil for your garden…. and plants need awesome soil, sun, and water!
just manage them…. we have pumpkins growing in a raised bed with tomatoes… they havent gotten to out of control because they are enclosed…. and if they start to expand trim them back once you have some pumpkins starting… the plant will put energy into the pumpkin and not growing like crazy.
Two things will make life easier for you and better for the plants:
an automatic valve drip line soaker hose…and miracle grow fertilizer
go here:
http://www.dripirrigation.com/drip_irrigation_categories/37
and see my lil bloggy for our fabby garden pics. It’s the drip line that makes such a difference, I swear!
Like your Pappap, my Ma was an amazing gardener.
Took me a little while ( and a few dead plants) to get the hang of it as well….like everything else, it takes practice. Make sure you are planting the best varieties for your area too-just because a local store sells it, it doesn’t mean it will grow like crazy in your neck o the woods.
Oh and you can put in onion, garlic, brussel sprouts, cauliflower, and some cold weather squashes, kale….anything “fall/winter” ish. they will last until that first deep frost….enjoy the new gardener learning curve 🙂
I hate to ask this because I feel like it’ll jinx my winning chances…but has the winner been annouced from last week’s giveaway? For somereason I thought it was going to be announced on Monday.
I believe garlic is fall-planted, and you harvest in the spring. Look at some lettuces/greens to see if those could be fall-planted.
Those tomatoes look great Katie!! I live in Australia where seasons are opposite, although we do have a very mild winter here. I recently planted our winter crop, and its going great guns! I recently posted about it here http://krispynoodles.blogspot.com/2011/08/vege-garden-update.html but then we’ve had about 6 straight days of rain since then, and now its tripled in size (time for a new post!) We also have strawberries in pots and my son checks them EVERY day for readiness – its so great for the kids 🙂
Do you mean cut the steam back or the branches-I just want to make sure I do it correctly.
We moved into a house last spring and tried our hand at gardening – it’s been so much fun! I’ve been chronicling it on my blog here, http://www.thestrengthoffaith.com/search/label/our%20garden. We’ve definitely made some rookie mistakes, but it’s been so much fun!
I live in Iowa and garden every year but I can’t offer much advice for gardening in Georgia. Up here I put in lettuce and sweet peas last month (my second planting) in the hopes that I’ll get a second harvest but it’s been hot and dry and I haven’t watered enough. If I were you I would get a month-by-month book for your zone or find a website with advice. Your garden looks great with the fence and little door! Really, water is the most important thing and I imagine you would need to water yours daily.
Yum, yum, yum! Those tomatoes look delicious. I haven’t been brave enough to try a vegie garden yet, I have this irrational fear of eating things that I grew myself. Weird, but true.
My gosh, I have thought the exact same thing!
Good for you for starting a garden! It’s so rewarding, and even though you’ve had some issues with the drought, it’s still a great thing to do. I love when people garden with children. It helps kids connect with where food comes from (i.e. NOT the store) and allows you to teach them how to grow their own nutritional food without chemicals. Of course maybe Will is a bit young to grasp all that, but in the future he’ll appreciate it!
And while I commend your husband’s grass removal technique (and if I may say, also his grass removal outfit), I have some potentially disappointing news for you: you didn’t have to remove that grass. If the soil was quite compacted you can take a gardening fork and loosen it a little bit, but otherwise you don’t need to do anything but put your new, good soil on top. If you’re worried about grass growing through you can always put a couple layers of newspaper on top and then pile soil on top.
Just a tip for when you expand your garden! 🙂
I love this! I hope to plant a garden next spring… I just started a new workout plan and am hoping to be fit and eating much healthier by next spring! I will definitely be using this to show my husband what our garden will look lilke! haha I love love love reading your blog! I hope to be as great of a mom as you are some day.
This is late, but cut the stem back.
You really need a life rather then continuously read a blog you just make fun of.
For weed control try using a scrap piece of carpet in the garden. Cut holes in the carpet where you are putting the plants. The carpet will:
1. help control weeds
2. let the rain water through
3. help preserve moisture when the drought hits.
You could use old carpet – but who knows what kind of dirt is in it. Scraps are easy to come by if you watch for people getting new carpet installed.