Hello friends! I hope you’re getting excited to garden with me! It is that time of year, after all. Since we finally stopped having frost warnings every night, I was able to get some of the plants put in. However, I was only able to get 9 tomato plants and will need to go get some more. I was waiting to see if any of the seedlings came up, but it doesn’t look good.

I know I’ve talked a little bit about what gardening means for me, but I thought I’d talk a little more about it today. Feel free to scroll for pictures, if you don’t want the family history!

First off, look at this gorgeous iris!

Iris remind me of my Grandpa Ed. He was a great gardener and I think the iris at my parents’ house are descendants of his iris. I was too young to do much actual gardening with him, but I do remember playing outside in the back yard under various shady trees and admiring the garden. That’s also why I started growing rhubarb. I do remember making hats with the rhubarb leaves, with Grandpa’s permission, of course!

Currently my rhubarb has gone to seed, but I’m wondering if I cut it off if it will grow more. You can see it in the upper left part of this picture. It’s next to the strawberries which came back with a vengeance this year. Now I have to see if I can beat the pesky squirrels to them.

Both grandpas were actually involved in gardening or agriculture in some way. My other grandpa was a missionary and managed an experimental agriculture plantation in New Guinea and the Philippines. Apparently he enjoyed running around shirtless and wild looking. So wild looking and hairy in fact, that the native people asked him to put a shirt on frequently! They had raspberries growing in their UP backyard, some of which were transplanted to my parents’ backyard as well.

Mom is a spectacular gardener and Dad helps too, so I grew up getting to pick out special flowers and having my own corner of the vegetable garden to tend to. I think the garden grew a little bit bigger every year and now that all the kids are out of the house, it pretty much takes over the backyard there.

Our garden space is not quite as big, nor as nice looking sometimes, but I love it anyway. (Did I tell you that when the house next door was for sale, they very carefully only took pictures from the angle that did not include the cinder block beds filled with tomato tangles? 🙂 )

I shared our set up after making the third bed, but here it is with more plants added. Tomatoes! So far I have 8 tomato varieties: Sun Sugar (cherry,) Siam, Large Red Cherry, Grape, Cherokee Purple, Yellow Pear, a Yellow Globe (I think?,) and a mystery tomato that had a tag, but turned out to be just a price, not the name. I think it might be a drought resistant variety. I couldn’t find Mr. Stripey and forgot to seed save last year. If I find him again this year, I’ll do that. There are some seeds and seedlings planted as well, but I don’t know that they will come up. Carrots down the middle too!

Peppers, beans, and peas. If the beans and peas come up. Also carrots down the middle for later. I think possibly squash as well. I have to check tags again. So far I have some Carnival Pepper seedlings planted in between the plants. A lot of the pepper seedlings survived! Then I have cuc seeds planted along the side, but may replace them with plants if they don’t germinate. I have an orange bell pepper, a jalepeno, and a hot banana pepper planted. There’s a straightneck squash and an acorn squash as well. There may be shisito peppers as well, but they were from seed, so I’m not sure if I actually planted them or just imagined it.

Berry bushes! Onions that I have no idea when to pull, and squash. Something ate my original raspberry plant. I’m hoping it comes back. I also got a thornless blackberry plant. Possibly a dead blueberry plant. Not sure what to do with that one. Zucchini in the back corner.

The marigolds from the farm store were so pretty! I was going to get more at Home Depot, but they looked so bedraggled and terrible. They may be helping with insects eating the other plants, but the squirrels keep munching on them for a snack. Piggy will also not chase squirrels. We keep getting defective squirrel chasers. Cats, they would both chase, squirrels have a free pass. Piggy probably politely shares the tomatoes with them. *shakes head sadly*

Here’s the rest of the herbs to finish it off. The empty looking blue pot has lemon balm that came back. The terracotta pot has parsley. There’s blue cone flower in the black pot on the right, tarragon and rosemary in the grey pot, bee balm in the other blue pot, and “pet grass” in the tiny pot. Perhaps I can persuade Piggy to leave the other stuff alone.

3 types of basil so I don’t have boring Caprese salad (The Horror!) This year I have regular sweet basil, purple basil, and Presto Pesto (I think?) basil. That basil has a white outline and is thicker than the other basils. It’s not as strong tasting either, but that could be because it’s younger. In the grey container I have sage that came back, even after being outside all winter and German Thyme.

I have a plan to get more hot peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes, of course! I want to turn the strawberry planter into a tea planter instead. It didn’t work well with the strawberries. If I can’t find enough smallish herb varieties, I’ll put tiny fairy plants in it on the porch with some fairy garden things.

I’m excited to get started with the garden and hope that it will go better than last year. We have a watering system in all three beds, so that should make it relatively easy. I also have two buckets with some bok choy and rainbow chard in a big bucket, and a salad bucket with lettuce, spinach, and arugula! They just look like empty dirt buckets currently, so no pictures.

What are your gardening plans this year? Do you have any new and exciting things growing? Tell me all about it!