How does your garden grow?

With lots of hard work – that’s how!

Here is our garden as of yesterday.  Each crop has a special memory tied to it: I planted potatoes with the kids as a norther blew in, me digging a trench while two kids dropped in seed potatoes at a spacing measured by a stick and two kids covered them. Even though a bit chilly, it was gratifying to be out there with my little crew. I remember another night in the dropping temps, covering little plants by flashlight with tarps weighted by rocks. Even the corn has a crazy memory of planting and weeding as the weather first rains, then hails, then turn sunny and oppressively muggy all in about 45 minutes while we worked.

A crazy amount of rain has really helped our efforts along – but also necessitated some erosion control.

Last weekend we recruited some labor from Brian’s brother and procured a trailer load of compost from the nearby horse farm.  The owner kindly used his tractor to load us up.

It’s crucial to keep the grass competition away from our peach trees if we want good growth and production. The compost will go a long way in maintaining the weed pulling we did when the Big Event group came to help out. The trees are so happy and beautiful – and there are even a few little peaches this year!

After landscaping with Brian’s brother, the next day we unloaded the rest of the stuff onto the garden. Iris was our main help.

Brian tested his new toy – a super tiller that takes quite a man to handle. It does a fantastic job breaking up soil and mixing stuff in.

Ivy took this picture to prove that I help a little – even though Brian does the real muscle work. Eden and I unloaded most of the compost. The kids were all super good while we worked and at the end they helped sweep out and hose down the trailer to be returned. Then we all bounced along down the road to return it – it was getting late and I told them they were so cheerful and helpful that they got to have a trailer ride instead of just being put to bed.

Yesterday we pulled our onion to make room for the next crop. Iris tried the onion flowers but I don’t think they suited her. Eden and I had a big discussion over which plants were potatoes and which were tomatoes – confusingly similar words.

Iris takes a break from gardening to go swimming in the rain bucket. Same day as previous picture, second outfit. These kind of days the children literally have to “wash up” for meals!

Brian is a count the cost kind of guy and really, gardening is  probably only worth it because we really like it. I love that it makes an excuse to be outside, it provides an opportunity to teach the little ones and some of the produce I would grow just because it tastes better. I’m glad God sends the sun and rain and only a few pests each year so I have time to learn how to deal with each one. If gardening was the first job in paradise, maybe it’s no wonder we enjoy it so much.