AT THE WATER’S EDGE:

It is true that a lot has happened over the past few years. One of them was that we moved to a new house. New house meant new gardens. I was sad to leave behind my perennials (though we know the new owners and they graciously let me dig a few things up!) and the beds that I had worked on for 10 years. Additionally, Tom had just built me raised beds at our last house and we moved before we even got one full season out of them — but it was by far the most successful garden that I had ever had.

As we moved into our new home, I was eager to try raised beds again — with a bit of a bigger space, and fortify it with a proper fence now that we had no neighborhood rules we had to abide by. Among a myriad of other new home projects, Tom graciously granted my request demand for a new beautiful raised bed garden. He did an amazing job! It was just the way I envisioned (even better, really) and includes a deer-proof fence, raised beds, crushed stone pathway and even a spot for hanging baskets to decorate the outside. We filled the beds with Dairy Doo garden soil blend and I planted seeds and starts as soon as I could.

The first year, in 2021, I didn’t have time to put in spring crops, but I had an amazing summer garden with the most gigantic squash plants / leaves I’ve ever seen. Seriously. When I stood among them I felt like I was in a scene from Jurassic Park or something. We had an abundance of zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes and cucumbers. I also started strawberries and asparagus which grew phenomenally and quickly filled the bed where I co-planted them. The co-planting is still kind of a test but I think I would recommend it. The strawberries have done amazing and the asparagus spears grow through the strawberry plants. The only problem is that they are a little hard to see when they are small and the strawberries are perking up as they head in to peak season.

Last year, in 2022, the crop of the year was Swiss chard. I don’t really love chad, but I love the look of the Bright Lights Swiss chard — with stems of green, white, yellow, orange and red, they make a beautiful rainbow of color in the garden. So, I planted some. And it grew. And grew. And grew. Until one of the plants basically turned into a tree! I don’t know how else to describe it. The older/larger stems merged and formed a sort of trunk that ultimately grew into a “tree” reaching over 5 feet tall! It was quite the wonder. I left it to overwinter because it was so amazing and was even able to eat some leaves off it the next spring before I finally had to pull it. I also tried growing onions from seeds last year for the first time. I learned a few things and am still working on getting them to grow well. I grew ground cherries for the second time. If you’ve never heard of them, they are a small husked fruit (think tomatillos) that look like yellow marbles when ripe. They taste…interesting. Like a combination between a tomato and a pineapple, perhaps. I don’t love them and can never find enough uses for them but they are uniuqe and were fun for something new. We also grew these amazing Cosmic Purple carrots that I think are going to become an annual staple.

This year, 2023, I had great success with radishes after flopping for a few years in a row. I planted German Giant radishes — and they really do get huge! They were beautiful. I also planted a new type of bush bean — a French filet bean (Maxibel Haricot) that is the best green bean I’ve ever grown. Although they are bush types, they were a bit viney. They grew the best long, slender and tasty beans — without becoming too big to eat if you don’t pick them as soon as they’re of size. And they produced all. season. long. I wanted to try bush beans again after I got tired of waiting for the pole beans that don’t come in until August. My bush beans were coming in strong in July and lasted until October! There were a few lulls but they kept ramping up again. I plan to grow these as my bean of choice from here on out. We grew the purple carrots again, along with yellow. I prefer the purple. My lettuce bolted early on me after a heat spell and my cucumbers didn’t grow well. I tried some new squash this year — acorn didn’t germinate for some reason, but I got six or seven spaghetti squash! That’s been a fun garden treat that we can continue eating as the weather gets cold. I tried to grow butternuts, as well, but the two I got were tiny and got some sort of disease or something before I even got them off the vine. My onions had to have a do-over on the seed starting so they got a later start than I wanted. They didn’t get as much sun as I’d planned on and consequently didn’t grow well. One other fun success for the year was garlic! It was my first time really trying at garlic and it grew great. I couldn’t find a good place for seed garlic so I picked some up at our local pig farm when I saw they had sime nice hardneck garlic bulbs for sale. I ordered some different varieties for next season which I need to get in the ground post haste!

It’s been fun having the kids help me in the garden. They’ve helped plant, harvest, water, weed, taste test and pull out plants at the end of the season. J is a great helper and loves digging up carrots and eating them fresh from the garden (after a good wash, of course!). P is a precise planter and she’s been a great help at the beginning of the season making sure we get our seeds in the right place. I hope that they will grow to love seeing things grow as much as I do. There’s something very satisfying in growing your own food and growing plants up from seeds. And who doesn’t love playing in the dirt?! Besides the vegetable garden, I’ve been working perennials into the landscaping and adding flowers all around! That’ll have to be a post for another day. I’m looking forward to many more years of enjoying this beautiful gardening paradise.

“But where our hearts truly lie is in peace and quiet, and good tilled earth.“

The Lord of the Rings (film)