Gardening ☺☺☺

So, I've been trying to get this post up for days now, but it took until yesterday for us to finally get our garden started. I promised I'd take pics....and I did. I will also post a few photos of last year's garden. Yesterday was nice. The day began with all of us going to the eye doctor. My daughter will be getting glasses for the first time. She's really happy about this. lol Then we all went out to lunch. Then we came home, put my son down for his nap, got my daughter started on her school work, and then David and I spent a little time together. ♥♥♥♥

Then David commenced with the plowing. While he did that, my daughter, the neighbor kid and I started planting herbs. Planting your own herbs is so easy and inexpensive...and way better than using the dry stuff. It's also a great growing project for kids. All you need is some milk jugs, scissors, potting soil, and seeds. Just cut the tops off the jugs, cut a few holes in the bottoms for drainage, fill with soil and plant your seeds according to package. ☺

 

 Before David plowed we had to harvest my turnip greens and the rest of my spinach. I planted a garden last fall and didn't do too much with it since I didn't have the time and it rained almost everyday...it got cold too. I was surprised after all the snow and rain, that these two things came back. I've been picking off the leaves and adding them to smoothies. I know the spinach doesn't look great but that's b/c it got mixed in with a bunch of weeds. Before the day is over, I'll go sit on my front porch to strip the stalks down, cut the turnips, and freeze everything back in my deep freeze for future use. The turnips may be too hard or fibrous to eat but will make good for vegetable broth.

These are some watermelon and bell pepper seedlings. Since I'm gettingmy garden out late, I'm using seedlings instead for some things that take a while to grow...especially watermelon.

This was last year's watermelon...they were so sweet and good.

Then, the kids and I started planting. They lasted for about 5 minutes in the beginning so I planted on my own for a while. They came back to help when I had to plant the seedlings.

During that time Enoch woke up and came outside. He laid on the ground looking at the sky. He loves to look at clouds and the passing jets. ☺

This is how it looks now after planting everything. I have six rows in all and I'm growing squash, zucchini, green bell peppers, banana peppers, watermelon, sugar snap peas, spinach, tomatoes, cucumber, greenbeans, and a few mustard greens. I set my herbs in front of the garden to collect rain and sunshine. They also helped marking the first few rows for me.

This is last year's garden. This year's garden will be a little bigger b/c last year my squash literally squashed out many of my other veggies...the zucchini had a hand in it as well. I gave them ample room this time around.

This is my homestead. The garden sits right out in front so I look in on it every morning while taking in the fresh country air on my porch. ☺

Would any of you know what type of bush this is? It has green foliage with hints of red in the leaves and during the spring, hot pink pom pom like flowers blossom on it.

Anyway, that was our gardening day. I'll post pics as everything grows. I found two grapevines and a blueberry plant on sale for $4 at Aldi's so I'll be setting those out today. If you've never tried growing your own food before, I highly recommend it. It's relaxing, fun, and healthy. ☺