gardening

• September 11, 2013

  The Truth About Carrots and Rad Radishes

  I learned something interesting about carrots the other day.  Apparently, they are biennial plants, which are only supposed to flower every other year.  So, carrot seeds that you buy for your garden should not grow into flowering plants.  I found this fact particularly interesting since I planted carrots for the first time last year, and…

• July 25, 2013

  Garden Trials and Treasures

  I’m growing chipmunks now!! Gardening is hard. Every year I am learning new things, but it also seems that each year presents new challenges.  My first year of gardening, the bunnies ate all of my peas.  So, we put up a fence, and I had not seen the bunnies back until this year.  The fence…

• June 23, 2013

  Garden Wars: Identifying the Culprits

  Somebody keeps eating my corn; I don’t think I’ll be getting any this year.. It’s happening again. Someone is snacking in my garden. Snacking on tender green shoots that should be growing into corn, beans and sunflowers; snacking on the tops of carrots; snacking on peas; and even snacking on a potato plant. I’ve been…

• June 6, 2013

  True Confessions of a Plant Hoarder

  Really, I enjoy gardening because I like playing in the dirt! I think I have a problem. In my desperate attempt to get things to grow in my garden and with my love for all things green and flowery, I think I have become a plant hoarder. Let me back up just a bit. When…

• June 4, 2013

  Vegetable & Flower Gardens – Progress to Date

  It’s high time for a gardening update!  I had a very late start to my garden this year, due to the unusually long winter that we experienced here in Michigan.  I started some of my seeds indoors in March, but wasn’t able to plant my “early spring” seeds outside until April 21st (I really need…

• May 9, 2013

  April (Snow) Showers Bring May Flowers

  Snow storm on April 19th I’m going to be honest: I have complained about the weather a LOT this year.  January wasn’t bad, February was about on par with average, and I began to gear up for spring come March.  You know the whole “in like a lion, out like a lamb” thing?  Well, I’d…

• September 6, 2012

  Gardening 101: Ten Lessons Learned

  This week marks three years since we’ve been in our house.  That means I’ve now had three years of gardens, and with those three years of experience has come a lot of learning!  I didn’t really know anything about gardening, and still feel like I don’t…but I do know that I’ve learned some things along…

• August 25, 2012

  Garden Inspirations

  I realized that I’ve been really slacking on the blog this month.  I don’t know what it is, but I just haven’t felt the urge to write and I’ve been lacking in ideas for topics.  So, naturally, I turned to Twitter hoping to find someone willing to offer a suggestion.  Sure enough, Gina came through…

• August 24, 2012

  Digging for Buried Treasure

  Can you identify? I think it’s just some variety of green chili pepper… My garden is not doing so well.  I’ll be honest.  I’m disappointed.  The heat, and my sporadic watering, coupled with the deer and squash bugs have left my garden lacking in produce.  The deer have eaten my Swiss chard again, so I…

• July 15, 2012

  Oh, Deer! (and other tales from the garden)

  I have had a new visitor to my vegetable garden this year: deer. We have a field-ish type area behind our house, scattered with trees, and there are deer that live back there. From time to time we’ll see them in the backyard, but until this year, they’d stayed clear of my garden. A couple…