Well, it's cold and rainy and windy outside today. I had to turn the heat on in the house for the first time in weeks. So Daisy and I are all snuggled up inside. She's dog-napping on her favorite couch and I'm waiting for Joey to get home from work. Since it's so blustery outside I thought I would give you a peek at my inside vegetable garden. On March 18th I planted tomato, pepper, and eggplant seeds in a seed-starting tray. The eggplants are Black Beauty, peppers are California Wonder, and the tomatoes are Baxter's Bush Cherry, German Pink, and Rutgers. They are coming up well.
I will have to transplant the tomatoes to bigger containers soon. I have been trying to learn about container gardening because I am afraid to plant a garden if we have to move. I don't want to have to leave my tomatoes behind! So I got a book through inter-library loan called Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces by Gayla Trail. The author writes about growing food in cities and in houses without backyards. It's a pretty cool book because it basically says you can grow food anywhere, even with very little space. I am going to try to grow some of my veggies in containers this year and then if we move this summer, I may still have time to plant some things in the ground as well. Last year, I moved to this house in June and didn't get my garden started until almost July and I still had a couple crops of green beans, lots of cucumbers, a few eggplants and green peppers, cherry tomatoes from a transplant, and lots of basil.
I also planted some herbs in pots I got from Walmart for $2.50 a piece. I planted Basil, Dill, and Cilantro. I hope to use the basil with my tomatoes for sandwiches and sauces, the cilantro and peppers and tomatoes for salsa, and the dill to turn cucumbers into pickles.
I will have to transplant the tomatoes to bigger containers soon. I have been trying to learn about container gardening because I am afraid to plant a garden if we have to move. I don't want to have to leave my tomatoes behind! So I got a book through inter-library loan called Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces by Gayla Trail. The author writes about growing food in cities and in houses without backyards. It's a pretty cool book because it basically says you can grow food anywhere, even with very little space. I am going to try to grow some of my veggies in containers this year and then if we move this summer, I may still have time to plant some things in the ground as well. Last year, I moved to this house in June and didn't get my garden started until almost July and I still had a couple crops of green beans, lots of cucumbers, a few eggplants and green peppers, cherry tomatoes from a transplant, and lots of basil.
I also planted some herbs in pots I got from Walmart for $2.50 a piece. I planted Basil, Dill, and Cilantro. I hope to use the basil with my tomatoes for sandwiches and sauces, the cilantro and peppers and tomatoes for salsa, and the dill to turn cucumbers into pickles.
Here is a list of some of my favorite gardening books for those of you thinking about starting a garden this year:
The Dirt Cheap Green Thumb by Rhonda Massingham Hart
The Backyard Homestead by Carleen Madigan
The Moosewood Kitchen Garden by David Hirsch
The New Self-Sufficient Gardener by John Seymour
All of these books have great ideas and illustrations. Grow Great Grub has great color photos. Mother Earth News Magazine is also one of my favorite resources for gardening and homesteading ideas.
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