My name is Annette (Hi, Annette), and I am delighted to provide a guest post for Angie this weekend. I'm the author of Weighty Matters, and a lifelong foodie... okay, not a "foodie" per se, except in the sense that, well, I like food and I like to eat.
But to be honest, I never cared much about where it came from other than my cabinet, or the grocery store shelf.... until recently, that is. I want the best possible food to go into my body to fuel it, and I love a good bargain too. Sometimes I luck out with both, and other times.... well, in most cases, the wallet trumps all.
And there's nothing I love more than good quality fresh fruits and vegetables. I don't think we appreciate just how lucky we are here to have so many ways to get them: not only from local farms and farmers' markets, but so many backyards! For many years now, we've gardened a piece of a community plot. Heck, the last couple of years, it's just been Daddy farming it. Sadly, for the last few years, it's been hit-or-miss. We had a bumper crop of crookneck squash one year, and the next..... nearly nothing.
So after last year, he made the decision to let it lie fallow this year. And he has so far, with plans to fertilize in the fall, turn it under, let the winter do its thing, fertilize again in early spring and turn again and hopefully by late spring, it will be ready to do its magic. But I have been jonesing for some fresh veggies... what to do, what to do? Plant my own, in containers.
Darn that store, where they had the little tomato-growing-kit. They started the whole thing rolling - you can see them in the first picture, in the rectangular box. That was May 13. And the next picture is fr
om May 25......
I have a whole slew of them -- please feel free to browse around at the pictures here:
May 11 Album and May 25 album (oh, the dog? he grows, but trust me, we aren't giving him any extra fertilizer!!)
And in the meantime, you're always welcome to visit Weighty Matters, where I tend to pontificate at great length.... :) but always with a wry, dry, sly sense of humor! And thanks to Angie again for this opportunity!
Thank you Annette! I am always so inspired by your stories, and most recently I have a lust for your container gardening :) I appreciate you stopping by and sharing with us!
ReplyDeleteNO WAY! That is stinking awesome! Can you tell me more? I want to do this...in Michigan!
ReplyDeleteHi Jen - this is my first time really doing container gardening, and so what I did was.....
ReplyDeleteFirst section: no kidding, I hit a Dollar General or Family Dollar or some such store and found a tomato seedling kit - grow your own. That's how it started. Dang them all. Literally, it was 10 peat pods, and a few seeds, and a miniature greenhouse. Those, my peppers, my small lavender (the purple container) and my original strawberries (RIP) were what I started from seeds.
Everything else has just been already-started plants that I've nurtured along. If you're going to stay just in containers, I would suggest getting a large enough pot (not too large) when you begin transplanting the seedlings or the smaller plants once they've started to grow. Right now, my zucchini are already blossoming so absolutely as soon as possible, I will have to transplant them again. I bought a 4' x 4' (16 sq feet) raised bed for my yard, and that's where I'm moving the veggies (my tomatoes, the zucchini, cucumbers, peppers, and eggplant, once they're a little further along). The herbs are pretty good just to stay in pots. I bought a bookoo of plastic drainable pots at Big Lots and matching saucers. I think I have maybe $15 invested in all that? I already had some clay pots from other things here at the house so I've recycled some of those. My dad gave me the 5-gallon bucket for the blueberry bush, which I'm leaving alone for now. He was even nice enough to drill the drainage holes for me!
There's a little tiny book I got at Tractor Supply about beginning gardening, and it was a huge help. I also bought an original edition of "Square Foot Gardening" (not knowing they'd actually updated it for the 30th anniversary this year.... DOH!). AWESOME resource for small gardening.....
Here's a link to Ferry-Morse Seed Co. and their section on container gardening .... http://www.ferry-morse.com/gardeners_corner.aspx?t=3&m=1.