Garden Envy Adventures

We've been really enjoying our little garden.  It's not much and I'm still learning lessons...and battling deer and rabbit. I'd love to have the time to make it super special.  Maybe this Fall we can make it part of the children's lessons.  I know Zander and Drew would both love that.

I really like Potager style gardens that combine edibles with beautiful flowers so the whole garden looks beautiful.  The slightly more British take is the "Cottage Garden" another philosophy of making sure the place that you grow your veggies looks pretty.  Though it is a bit less manicured looking that I'd like (and the HOA would be cool with, hah).

1) Bayless Gardens

From https://shawnacoronado.com/

My biggest source of garden envy is the Bayless Gardens in Chicago.   I would not call myself the biggest tracker of Michelin stars, but back in my wilder days as a Chicago-ite, I did indulge a bit in such things.  Rick Bayless has not only name recognition but also, he does a good job of presenting a down to earth image.

He lives in a very trendy neighborhood of Chicago called Bucktown and owns three houses.  He lives in one, rents out the other two and churns out veggies for his garden in the 3 city lots.  A standard Chicago lot is  25x125ft.  But that includes the buildings.  I've heard that the whole backyard area is only 1000 square feet, but he pumps out $200,000 worth of organic produce for his restaurants!  Interestingly, he does not practice crop rotation.  He just liberally adds compost and employs the use of beneficial flowers.  He succession sows to keep greens coming for his restaurant.  Okay HE doesn't succession sow personally so much.  He employs a team of gardeners to help tend it since a garden this size is a full time job and he's got a restaurant empire to run!  It's not just one gardener either...but a whole team so I guess I can forgive myself for not having a garden like this!

He also keeps chickens in his backyard, which is not as unusual as you might think in Chicago.  I have several friends who have them.  And he as a roof top garden at one of his other restaurants that make peppers, tomatoes and onions.

2) The Nitty Gritty Potager Blog

From The Nitty Gritty Potager

This blogger has a beautiful blog and garden!  She actually has moved over to Olde Thyme Food Garden, which also has drool worthy pictures.  I love her mixture of ornamentals along with the edibles.  She's created a great environment for all the best bugs and animals and it looks amazing.

She has great advice for every season and so many different veggies and flowers.

And, she has a wonderful Pinterest board: https://www.pinterest.com/tanja_pickrell/

3) The Gardens at Otahuna Lodge

From https://www.otahuna.co.nz/

Otahuna Lodge is a beautiful Victorian mansion in New Zealand.  They host events in their beautiful gardens and have multiple suites for guests to stay overnight.  The potager garden grows many vegetables that the chef uses for the meals.  Guests can even help pick their own vegetables for dinner!  So cool!  I have officially added this place to my wistful bucket list of places I'd love to go.  I already wanted to see New Zealand, but this garden is just an even bigger carrot to go (pun intended).

4) Mark's Veg Plot

From https://marksvegplot.blogspot.com

I like that this garden has an eating space in it.  Although in this picture you can't see so many of his beautiful plants.  I just really love the idea of a little eating nook nestled amongst the lush greenery.  If you click here you can see some more pictures.  I'm so impressed with all the produce he can create in his lot.  He also has a great collection of good advice.

5) The Garden Roof Coop

From http://www.thegardenroofcoop.com

Here is another blogger who has a wonderfully amazing garden. The marigolds as edging are so pretty.  And functional as they attract all the right kinds of bugs and discourage several bad ones.  Plus the friendly bright colors are so inviting.  In addition to her kitchen garden, she also has some great resources on making a buttery garden!

6) Grow Veg

From Grow Veg

Grow Veg encourages planting edibles with ornamentals, but this particular post has some great ideas.  This is actually a company that makes a garden planning software.  Interesting concept.

Newspaper Seedling Pots Adventures

I was hoping to get my first spinach, carrots, beets and chard in the garden today, but it SNOWed!!!!  What?!  That's Indiana for you.

So, instead, I decided to plant some seedlings that I was actually a bit behind on.  And I decided to try something new!  I made little seedling pots out of newspapers! 

Apparently, most newspapers are printed with soy based ink these days so are fine for composting and in this case, using as fun little free planting pots.  Masking tape is also compostable.

I plan to just plant this whole thing in the garden and let the newspaper decompose.  I'll probably open the bottom.  Also, as a side note...if you do this, make sure to put the whole newspaper under the ground, otherwise it'll just capillarity up the water to the top of the paper and let it evaporate.  If you aren't sure, that's a bad thing.  We want water in the ground, not evaporated.  So, if you plant it with the newspaper pots, just burry the newspaper and you'll be fine.

I took a piece of news paper, folded it in half, rolled it around the can such that enough was left on the bottom to fold under. 

I taped the side and then I folded it and taped it like I was wrapping a little Christmas present for myself.  If there is a little gap, that's totally fine because that just means extra drainage. 

I used a can of green beans, but you can use any jar, cup, etc that is the size you want it.  You can also make the pot any size tall.  I went with about 5 to 6 inches.  But if you are planting smaller things, you can make smaller pots.

My litte Blueberry wanted to help make little pots!

I made about 16 of them.

Then it was time to plant!  I used seed starting mix and got it wet until it reminded my little Tomato of Brownie batter.

I had this neat Hefty deep rimmed box that is a perfect little greenhouse.  I'm putting it on a sunny window sill to help with heat to germinate.  As soon as my baby plants pop out, I have a grow light for them.

Super easy...and even better, I didn't have to waste money on those peat pots!  I was a bit skeptical of the newspaper holding up to the moisture.  I even had some draining water and they seem fine.  I guess we'll see how they are in a few weeks!  I will keep you updated.

Has anyone else tried this fun little trick?

Companion Planting Adventures

My goal is have about 10% of my garden full of flowers.  There are a couple reasons for this.  First, I live in a community with an HOA with rules on landscaping.  So I'll make sure there are plenty of flowers to keep my garden looking pretty!

But another major reason is that the right flowers can attract beneficial insects that eat the "bad bugs", pollinators (like bees, butterflies, moths and maybe even humming birds), or detract "bad bugs".

All of these images are from Burpee.com and clicking on the links will take you to Burpee's site where you could purchase them.

Marigolds - These cheery little blooms are power houses of benefits.  Beetles that might attack beans, melons, potatoes, cucumbers and squash hate them as do the nematodes that attack tomatoes and eggplants.  They are mostly yellows and oranges, but as you can see from the images above, come in a few different "styles".

Nasturtiums - I'm super excited about planting Nasturtiums this year.  These little guys are edible...okay, lots of stuff are edible, but these taste great in salads or candied.  You'll for sure see a few posts on my culinary adventures with Nasturtiums in a few months.  But, even better, aphids hate them.  This helps so many plants like cabbages, broccoli, kale, Brussel sprouts, cauliflower, cucumbers and celery.  They also help the cucumbers and celery from beetles.

Borage - Borage is another edible flower.  Some say that the flowers have a cucumber flavor and is a yummy addition to lemonade.  Actually, it's classified as an herb and the leaves have various usages as well.  It helps strawberries and tomatoes resist various pests.  It also attracts lacewings which eat lots of bugs like aphids, mealybugs, spider mites and pretty much any slow moving insect.

Zinnias - These flowers are so pretty and come in a range of colors.  They are great in a cut arrangement.  Pollinators love them, including monarch butterflies!  Also, various insects that eat "bad bugs" love them too.  But, cucumber beetles and tomato worms do not love zinnias and stay away.  Awesome!

Alyssum - These attract various insects that eat aphids.  I hate aphids because they attack cabbages, broccoli, kale, Brussel sprouts, cauliflower, cucumbers and celery.  They are a low growing plant that can form a nice garden cover that acts like a living mulch to prevent weeds.  They come in a few colors, mostly white and purple.

Bachelor's Buttons (Cornflower) - This one attracts flower flies, ladybugs, lacewings, and helpful wasps.  These insects eat aphids among other things.


References:
* https://www.gardenguides.com/92101-beneficial-vegetable-garden-flowers.html
* https://gardenerdy.com/good-plants-to-attract-beneficial-insects-to-your-garden

Garden Planning Adventures

I've been growing fruit for a few years.  I felt like it was an easy way to ease into gardening.  Raspberries and blackberries are basically weeds so I knew they'd do alright.  We have had a couple of great years and now I am ready to expand into vegetable gardening.

I thought that I would start a new blog about my gardening adventures, but then I found this old blog with some great older posts and I figured that I'd just revive it!  So, I'm back at it!  I won't just focus on gardening.  I'll also keep posting about our life and adventures in Indiana...but around the time that the garden work picks up, my blog will probably have a lot about that!


Here is Pete and Z in front of one of our fruit boxes.



We've had pretty good success with our fruit and I'm ready to branch out to veggies!

I thought that I'd take a moment to pop up a level and share why I want to garden.

1) Reduce food miles and our carbon footprint
In the USA, food travels 1,500 miles+ before it hits our plates.  The way we farm with all these huge machines, pesticides, is taking a huge toll on our planet.  And then there are the containers to hold these food, usually from plastics, which come from fossil fuels.

2) Eat more cleanly
When you are farming on a smaller scale, it's easier to manually pick the bugs off your plants rather than spray everything and kill the good microbes of your soil along with the "bad bugs" eating your plants. Also, the sooner you eat food after you pick it, the healthier it is.

3) Connect with our food.
I want my kids to understand what "real food" is and that food comes from the ground not from a store.  I want them to understand (and me too, for that matter) that the closer food looks like something from the ground or directly from the animal, the healthier it probably is.  I also want them to know that carrots are not just orange.  They can be purple or white or red.  I want them to know that tomatoes can be big, small, green, orange, round, or oval.  Also, I hope that participating in the growing and harvesting of our food, my kids will be more willing to try new veggies.  We'll see how that goes.

4) Get Outside
I work from home.  Between that and the therapies for the boys, it's sometimes hard to prioritize getting outside.  My goal with the garden this year is to spend 15 minutes every day out in it.  This might be weeding, watering, de-bugging or harvesting.  If there is extra time, I can just sit and enjoy or teach the kids about the garden.

Do you garden?  If you do, why?  If you don't, but are thinking about it...what is calling you?