Growing Our Food

Past:

Growing up we had a vegetable garden. When my parents moved into their current house they inherited a garden from the previous owners. Although I have little memory of this vegetable garden I know it had asparagus for a year, some very low producing grapes, and some other vegetables that they planted. They also had an entire hedge of raspberries!

This garden was pushed aside for a few tomato plants when their deck was built, and gardening was pushed to the side. The berries still existed but the gardening time was replaced by raising kids and other duties of running a family and household.

When I was in my early teen years I asked my parents if I could dig up a patch of the lawn and plant some vegetables. They funded everything! I dug up an “L” shaped plot and planted a few veggies with the help of my brother. I have no idea what we planted but I remember the joy of having my family eat the produce I had grown.

Present:

My father is now OBSESSED with his vegetable garden. I find myself on the phone with him frequently talking about pests, disease, and the newest techniques. As a family we talk about preserving, drying, and recipes when ever we are together.

I have my own vegetable garden. With the help of my husband we put in a raised box garden the first summer we lived in our house. We buried a few posts, used some wood, and created a box that contains a pretty large amount of food (see pics below).

Steve carried over a ton of soil to the back yard and I have spent countless hours researching what to grow, when to plant it, and how to make it as organic as possible. In this garden we place our herbs, because it is close to our patio, for easy access, along with tomatoes, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, cucumbers, eggplant, zucchini, and a number of other items.

This year we created another garden, which will be expanded a bit next spring, along the back of our patio. I have found that this garden is great for squash of all kinds and lettuce/spinach in the spring. I do have a “dead zone” in this garden where the dogs run through. I also have planted cabbage in this garden recently to grow in the fall and will be putting in my second crop of lettuce/spinach soon!

Click pics to see larger versions!

This is our main box garden. This is from earlier in the year when we had lettuce growing
Cabbage (ok cauliflower) patch baby
Jackson eating tomatoes, he picks them himself

This is our new garden this year and Cameron

Future?:

I love my vegetable gardens but have recently come to the realization that gardening is one of the biggest things that brings joy to my life. To grow and provide my family with healthy, organic, and someday cost effective food (there is so cost in building a garden) that gives me pride unlike I have known before.

My husband and I have talked about buying some land in the past but recently with friends buying a small farm and enjoying the taste of absolutely fresh produce that we know is organically grown, we have started talking seriously about this.

I would love to have a garden like the one you see below. A completely boxed “lasagna” garden (more on this to come, but google it if you want to know now!). This kind of gardening has few weeds, upkeep, and pests. I would love to have a small orchard, berry bushes, strawberry patch, a few chickens (layers and fryers), possibly some meat rabbits (for sale), and a steer.

I know those of you who have known me in the past will find some of those ideas to be odd, after all I was a vegetarian for over 15 years, but this would allow our family to pretty much stop eating overly processed, chemical/antibiotic, food which has been shipped thousands of miles.

The truth is, we will always buy some food: flour, sugar, bananas, citrus, and other staples. I would love to bake all our bread, make our pasta, and make most of our food, I realize that it is not realistic to be making everything

!

Obviously this homestead is in a different part of the country but the way it is laid out is wonderful!

Pic from http://susty.com/path-to-freedom-dot-com-urban-homestead-farm-internet/