Gardening in the Front Yard

I apologize in advance for writing this post every year. Sometimes two times a year. It's just so fun to have a front-yard garden!

We planted our Spring/Summer garden over Spring Break. Here's what we have growing:

• Cucumbers
• Mint
• Watermelon
• Artichoke
• Bell peppers
• Beans
• Tomatoes
• Cantaloupe
• Pomegranates
• Figs

A front-yard garden is a lazy gardener's dream. I am forced to walk past it at least two times a day. It's very easy to weed when you are walking by and spot something. 

Walking by the garden at least twice a day ensures that we notice things as they progress. It's so fun to stop briefly to notice the tendrils of the bean plant reaching to climb up the cage or the tiniest bell pepper that's starting to form or the bean that's ready to be plucked. 

Having it in the front yard keeps it away from our dog (and chickens, when we have them). We don't seem to have a problem with other animals attacking it in the front. 

The trick to making the garden manageable is the automatic irrigation. It makes it possible to have a full-time job, a full family, and a garden. 

I love that our children get to experience the cycle of life through the garden. So fun! 

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A New Hobby

Book stores hold a special place in my heart. I have fond memories of walking into a book store feeling lonely, a little at odds with the world, a little out of place--and walking out with a deep contentment and a renewed sense of excitement. 

Lately I've been craving a trip to the book store. I'm feeling like I need a new hobby. I want to pore over a non-fiction book, take notes, make plans, and make something happen. But I have trouble fitting trips to the book store into my life as a mother. In the evenings, after the boys have gone to bed, I don't have the energy to get in my car and drive across town. On Saturday mornings when Matt takes the boys for a few hours, I want to run around the lake and write. 

So I've been holding this craving in my heart but haven't acted on it yet. Luckily, a book found its way to me: Cut Flower Garden: Grow, Harvest & Arrange Stunning Seasonal Blooms.

Thanks, creepy Amazon targeted marketing! This popped up while I was buying a new mattress topper, a chalk pen, and omega fish pills for the kids. 

This book looks like exactly what I need: a new project. I can't wait to plan how to bring flower gardens into our life and fill our house with blooms all year long. And gift bouquets to others! 

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Start a Garden!

If you have children, I wholeheartedly recommend starting a garden. It's the most amazing thing to watch children move through the planting to harvesting cycle. You don't even need a very big one to have a big impact. We've recently been harvesting Brussels sprouts and artichokes. Amazingness!

There are a couple ways we fit gardening into our crazy-busy lives:

1. Our raised beds are in our front yard, which means we are forced to pass by them and notice them every day. 
2. We have automatic irrigation--it changes everything! Here's a kit that might work well for a raised bed.

We put so little into our garden in terms of time and effort and yet get so much out of it. I highly recommend it! 

 

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Another Season of Gardening

And so the cycle of gardening begins again. We pretty much garden year-round in Central Texas! Well, actually, it is year-round here. 

The boys and I just pulled up the fall/winter garden. We harvested a bunch of cabbage. It was fun to watch broccoli completely flower (it attracts so many bees!). We pulled out all the lettuce, as well. We left our artichoke plants (they seem to grow all year long!) and our Brussels sprouts. 

Henry pulled a lot of snails out of our garden and moved them to a better spot. During the process, he noticed, "Mama! The snails are mating!" Sure enough, they were. It's so fun to watch things for the first time in person in my 38 years of life alongside my five year-old. He added, "They must love each other." Hooray for sexuality education with a preschooler. 

We then trekked to our favorite plant store (well, favorite plant store on our side of town; we actually love Natural Gardener more). We purchased mint, basil, okra, and tomatoes. 

I continue to swear by:

1. Front-yard gardening: It keeps everything away from pets and puts it in your line of site. We pass by it every single time we walk from our house to the car and the car to the house. We can't help but weed and harvest when we need to. It also puts us in better touch with our neighbors. 
2. Drip-irrigation: Not having to water a garden every day is a lifesaver. It makes gardening possible in our otherwise impossibly busy lives. 

I recommend this book if anyone wants an easy way to start gardening. We don't follow-it anymore, but it was helpful the first time we were thinking about setting up beds. 

Once your beds are in place, the best thing to do is to go to the garden store and see what transplants are available and recommended for planting! 

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The End of the Summer Gardening Season

On Saturday we ripped up all the watermelon, cucumber, and tomato plants from our front-yard garden. It's such a cathartic process to purge everything. 

We had a pretty good season. We didn't stake our tomatoes well and bought the really sprawling kind, so those didn't go as well as they could have. Our watermelon plants got aphids, but they continued to produce a ton of watermelons all summer long. Next year we'll be more intentional about which kind of tomato plants we buy, and we'll do some proactive organic stuff to head off the aphids. 

Last year, I was so spent from work that I had no energy for the fall growing season. This year I'm feeling much better. Once we get everything 100% cleared out, we'll add compost and some new soil and then plant some stuff for the fall. 

The front-yard garden is working out really well. The dogs, chickens, and pigs stay out of it. We haven't had any issues with neighborhood cats or other animals. The automatic irrigation is the best thing ever. I was really worried about installing a garden in our front yard because I was afraid that I would be overwhelmed with the work, everything would die, and our yard would look terrible. It's not much work at all (hallelujah!), we get food all season long (hooray!), and our yard looks fine even when there's nothing growing (phew!).

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Canning?

The garden is blooming! So far, we have the following things planted:

• Tomatoes
• Figs (from last year)
• Pomegranates (from last year)
• Peaches (from last year)
• Pears (from last year)
• Plums (from last year)
• Lemon grass (from last year)
• Rosemary (from last year)
• Bay leaf (from last year)
• Blueberries (from last year)

I think one of my goals for this season is going to be to learn how to can. We definitely won't be able to eat all of the tomatoes we produce during the summer season. Since we eat homemade pizza about 3-4 times a month, I think it would be useful to learn how to can pizza sauce. Any recommendations? What's the easiest and cheapest way to get into canning? 

This recipe looks useful for making pizza sauce to can. But do I really need to peel the tomatoes? That sounds a little too much for me (actually, a lot too much for me).

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'Tis the Season: Gardening

During Spring Break, I decided it was time to get our garden going for the 2015 Spring/Summer season. We ripped out the lingering weeds, kale, and cold weather lettuces. We dug out as many grubs as we could find. We added a layer of Ladybug Revitalizer Compost. And we made a trip to Red Barn Garden Center and purchased four tomato plants. 

I still remember debating whether I wanted to build four raised beds into the plan for our front yard. I worried that I would lose interest in gardening and wouldn't be able to keep up with it. I worried that I wouldn't be able to grow anything (since I struggled so much with my garden in Denver). 

But last summer was wonderful. The addition of automatic irrigation has made all the difference. And putting the raised beds between our front door and our cars ensures that we don't neglect the garden. I feel so fortunate to be able to share the "garden to table" experience with my boys. Both of them loved the whole process from start to finish. I'm looking forward to another season of it! 

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The Garden

Oh, the Garden!

I had such reservations about it because I had quite the black thumb when I lived in Denver. It turns out that automatic irrigation makes all the difference. We are able to set our watering days and times and then forget all about it. The only work I do in the garden is pull out weeds (which is actually quite satisfying to my sense of order). 

We are growing strawberries, cucumbers, watermelons, cantaloupe, tomatoes, bell peppers, and squash--oh my! 

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Finished: Front Yard!

I don't tend to write about a lot of "afters" in my life; I'm much more motivated to use this blog as a planning space. But I figured I should share our finished front yard!

We asked three different landscapers to come up with designs and estimates. We mainly got recommendations from neighbors whose yards we like. The first landscaper charged us to create the design; the second and third did not. The estimates varied widely, and we ended up liking a design in the lower-middle range of the three estimates.

Matt and I wanted a low-maintenance, drought-resistant front yard. I also wanted space to garden. I love, love, love how there's automatic watering for the plants around the yard (drip) and the vegetables/fruits in the garden beds (spray). Maintenance should be incredibly easy. It should only involve cutting a couple things down to the ground each winter (no mowing!).

In the end, we are very happy with the final product. Henry loves running on the straight line that cuts across the yard. I love how organized and calm everything feels now that it no longer looks like a construction zone.

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Planning the Spring Garden

I'm sorry it took me so long to post the plan for our front yard! It's kind of hard to tell what's going on without any of the labels, but the short version is that the four squares near our front porch steps are 4x4 raised beds made out of wood. The bed to the right of those is an herb garden. The bed along the sidewalk has five blueberry bushes in it. There is also a pomegranate tree, kale, basil, and some other edible things. The whole thing has drip irrigation which will help us save water and minimize the amount of work that is going into the front yard.

The good news is that we've finally saved up enough money to have the landscaping done. Woo-hoo! And since it's only April, there's still time to get stuff planted in the garden for the upcoming season. 

I've consulted the Vegetable Garden Planting Guide for my county, and it looks like we can plant things every couple months all year long (thanks, Texas!). Here's what we're planning for April:

• Sweet potatoes (4 per square)
• Greens 
• Okra (1 per square)
• Watermelon (1 per two squares)
• Carrots (16 per square)

Of course we reserve the right to modify the plan once we get to the garden store and see what's available and hear some of their recommendations! 

We'll be following the Square Foot Gardening method, so that we can maximize space and make the process easier for ourselves. I don't come from a family of gardeners, so it's not second nature to me. It's something I'm trying to learn. We'll see how it goes! 

Now that I'm sitting down to write this post, I'm realizing just how excited I am about this. I started this blog seven(!) years ago. My first post was about how I was starting to cook at home more and about how I wanted to take up gardening. The name "Feeding the Soil" came from an old organic gardening adage. My friend Camella shared it with me to describe the kind of education we were trying to implement in our English Language Arts classrooms (using the reading and writing workshop model). The idea was that education needed to be transformative and get to the very core of who we are as people (versus just dealing with the surface stuff). 

Matt and I attempted gardening with full gusto when we moved to Denver, but it was a big failure. Too hot. Too much work to water. Too little reward (if anything did ever grow, Hoss would eat it before we could). When we moved to Houston, our yard was too shady and we couldn't bring ourselves to chop down any trees to let in light. Then we moved to Austin and were in a rental house. And now we are finally settled in for the long haul. I opted to use our front yard for gardening because a) it's sunnier than the backyard b) we can keep Hoss and the chickens out of it more easily (although I am nervous about neighborhood cats) and c) we travel through it at least four times a day. We literally have to walk through the garden to get to our cars, so it will be easier to monitor and keep up with. Also, I'm hoping that the drip irrigation takes the hardest part out of gardening. Matt is skeptical that we'll be able to do it (given our previous lack of green thumbness), but I'm optimistic and excited! 

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Planning the Garden

Despite the fact that we've lived in our house since August, it still looks like a construction site (sorry, Neighbors!). It's been really hard to prioritize landscaping because a) it's so expensive and b) I'm juggling a million other things that feel much more urgent and important.

We did manage to get three different plans and quotes, and we fell in love with the design above. It's an edible landscape. The squares are raised beds that will provide 64-square feet of gardening space, strategically situated between our driveway and the front door so that we constantly have to walk through it. There are also five blueberry bushes! And a pomegranate tree! And an herb garden. And random things stuck in there like kale, swiss chard, etc. 

My favorite part is that the design includes drip irrigation, which is better for the environment and will reduce the amount of required maintenance. 

I think it will be a fun little place to explore and experience the awe of gardening. 

We're hoping to be able to get afford to get this done in the next couple months!  

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Inch by Inch, Row by Row: Front-Yard Garden

I've written this post so many different ways in my mind over the past week as I've debated whether or not to move forward with a front-yard garden. 

In one version of the post, I was going to write all about how we have to be honest with ourselves about who we are and what our preferences are--no matter what other people say/think and no matter what we tell ourselves in our own romantic stories about who we want to be. 

Ever since I started this blog in 2006(?) I've wanted to garden at home. We went to great efforts to make this dream a reality when we lived in Denver, but it was an epic fail. It required constant watering, and the Colorado sun scorched it and produced only one tomato (which Hoss promptly ate). It was a both a time- and money-suck. 

But I haven't given up on the dream of creating a productive rather than just a consumptive household. Especially now that I have children, I want them to see where food comes from and play a role in bringing it from seed to table. 

But I'm busy, busy, busy. And Matt informed me that he has no interest in taking over garden care (like he did in Denver). He already does most of our yard, dog, and chicken work. 

And I'm only going to get busier as a school leader. So am I kidding myself when I think that I'll make time for gardening on a weekly basis? Am I just pushing something on myself that no longer fits my reality? Would I rather spend an hour in the garden or going to the farmer's market instead? 

But I really do want to create the kind of home where we grow things. I want to work with Henry and Tate to plan the garden each season and then bring our plan to fruition. I want to minimize the work as much as possible (hooray for drip irrigation!), but I think it's still something I want to move forward with (and if it fails we can fill the planters with something like wildflowers, right?).

When I was talking to my friend about the amount of work that she puts into her garden each week, I was inspired by the idea of partnering with my neighbor to make our front-yard garden come to life. My neighbor was thrilled by the idea of our front-yard garden when she first heard about it. She explained that she always wanted one, but her husband at the time wasn't very supportive. I'm wondering if she has any interest in working together to bring a garden to life. She's not working right now, so she has more time to devote to it. I'm going to see what she thinks about us contributing the land, soil, and plants, while she contributes more of the time. Then we can share the harvest. The thing I love most about this idea is creating even more opportunities to interact with our neighbor and work alongside each other. Henry already talks about her a ton. Maybe if all of us worked together, we could give our little patch of earth the tending it deserves. 

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Preparing for Garden Season

The next garden season is a long, long time away for me. First, we have to get our house built. Then we have to save up money to build raised beds. Then we have to [hopefully] have our second child and go through the difficult transition into infanthood all over again. 

But after all that, I want to be ready. I talked with my friend who works at Urban Harvest in Houston, and she gave me some great advice:

• Start Small: Of course I wanted to start with many raised beds. She advised me to start with one, get a handle on it, and then expand the garden. I definitely see her logic.
• Install Drip Irrigation: She explained that garden stores sell drip irrigation kits that come with timers, so you can make your watering more strategic and even easier. 
• Start with Transplants: Of course I had grand visions of starting from seeds. She talked me back down to reality. I want to start as simply as possible, so that I'll be able to maintain what I start.

So here's my general plan:

1. Ask for this book for Christmas, so I can learn all about the specifics of gardening in Austin.
2. Create a master vision for where the raised beds will go at our new house. Even though we'll start small with one or two beds, we'll want to see how they will fit into the larger scheme. 
3. Create a vision for where to plant fruit trees. We should actually prioritize getting them planted as soon as possible, so we give them more time to grow and produce fruit. We might be able to do this as early as February if a) the north side of our house is nearly finished and further construction won't interfere with the growth of our trees and b) we have enough money to purchase the trees.
4. Start researching the best fruit trees to purchase. I need to visit The Natural Gardener. In fact, they have a free gardening class coming up in Austin. Let me know if you want to attend together!
5. Start shopping for rain barrels. I think there might be rebates available for installing rain water collection systems in Austin. I need to investigate this a little further. We would save money if we could get these installed while our house was being built.
6. Talk with one of my friends to see if she's interested in sharing a garden. She loves gardening but lives in an apartment. Our new house is going to be on her way home from work. She might want to share the costs, work, and harvest. 
7. Find a good internet tutorial for building raised beds (ooh, this one looks good!) or go back to my All New Square Foot Gardening book. We should try to build one as soon as we move into the house (if there's time before the baby is born). Once the baby is born, I don't want to have any major to-do items hanging over our heads.
8. Create a planting plan and schedule for Fall 2013! 

I'm very excited to get back into gardening. Matt and I had a big (yet mostly unsuccessful) garden in Denver. When we moved to Houston, we struggled with our overly-shady yard. Now we're in a rental house. I can't wait until we're settled into the house where we will hopefully stay for at least a decade or two. It feels good to slowly--but surely--be working toward our vision. By the way, I loved Nichole's post about building a homestead and putting down roots in a community for the long haul. Matt and I are getting closer and closer to doing this for ourselves.

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Container Gardening: Basil

Henry and I have decided that it's time to start gardening (well, I'd like to think that Henry is as excited as I am--humor me, okay?). On a recent trip to Whole Foods, we picked up a basil plant, grown at a local nursery.

My Little Herb Gardens book says that we should do the following:

1. For five to six plants, choose a container about 18 inches in diameter and at least 12 inches deep.
   
2. Make sure the container has a drainage hole.
3. Cover the hole with a little gravel, a few small rocks, or bits of broken pottery.
4. Fill a sink, bowl, or bucket with water and submerge the seedlings, still in their pots or trays.
   
5. Leave them until no more air bubbles appear so that the potting mix is saturated.
6. While the seedlings are soaking, fill the planting container with potting mix to within 1/2 inch of the rim. Soak the mix with water until it is thoroughly moist.
   
7. Scoop out holes 4 inches apart for the seedlings.
8. Put the seedlings and their root balls into the holes, packing potting mix around them.
9. Pat down the surface.
10. Water to fill in any air pockets.
11. Keep the soil moist but not soggy.
12. Fertilize every three weeks with liquid fertilizer.
13. Cut back flowering stalks in order to continue leaf growth.

Sounds pretty easy!

I'm so excited to start gardening. I think gardening with children is important for so many reasons:

• Children need more time in nature
• Children need to see where food comes from
• Gardening helps children develop their gross- and fine-motor skills
• Gardening helps children develop respect for the Earth
• Gardening helps children develop their independence and therefore their self-esteem
• Children learn more about cause and effect from gardening
• Children are more invested in eating healthy food if they grow and cook it themselves

I know five months is a little early to start gardening with Henry, but my goal is to make it a habit now.

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Gardening with Children

Oh, how I can't wait to set up a garden! I have really been dragging my feet. I originally started this blog in 2007 to chronicle my journey into organic gardening when we moved from Houston to Denver, but I ended up failing miserably.

When we moved back to Houston, I didn't start a garden because our backyard is way too shady. We're thinking about moving into a three-bedroom house sometime soon-ish, so I'm even more reluctant to start a garden. Plus, we have free-range chickens, and I'm worried about how they would interact with the garden.

But at least my class has a garden plot! It's amazing how it always seems to work out for us, even though I have no idea what we're doing. Last year, we planted and harvested lettuce and had a salad party. Then we planted and harvested sweet potatoes in May and harvested them when we returned to school in the fall (because I teach at a Montessori school, the students stay in the same classroom for three years). We cut them and turned them into sweet potato french fries. We had an awesome discussion about the difference between frying and baking.

Kids love healthy food when they are involved in its preparation. It's amazing! I can't wait to build a family garden, so our son can dig his hands into the dirt and witness the sheer amazingness of growing your own food.

I need to stop dragging my feet and just do it! Maybe I should do some container gardening, while we figure our our house situation...

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Responding to the Needs of Houseplants

Ever since I read Harmonious Environment and How to Grow Fresh Air, I've been committed to bringing more plants into our home. There's only one gigantic glitch: I'm terrible at taking care of them.

Seriously, I unintentionally (yet systematically) kill plant after plant that I invite into our house, even when they are supposedly the easiest plants to take care of. It sucks.

However, I am slowly getting better and better. I've started to approach my houseplant tasks more like a scientist. I pay more attention to the plants and try to be more responsive to what it is that they seem to need. I've realized that I can't just follow the directions written on the plant pot. Many of the directions say, "Water sparingly. Let plant dry out completely before watering." And yet in our house, these plants may need water once a week (which means I need to water the other plants even more frequently!).

Instead of following the directions, I've started trying to follow the plants. I try to look for the first signs of dehydration and respond as soon as possible. I've also tried to pay more attention to our plants' sunlight requirements. "Bright but indirect light" means different things for different plants. I've been experimenting with different spots for different plants and paying close attention to their progress.

Of course my new approach is completely in line with the Montessori teaching philosophy, which is based on an empirical model. Teachers are supposed to observe the children and respond accordingly.

It's also a good lesson as I head into parenting. Everyone keeps warning me that I can't learn how to parent from books and that I need to learn how to read our baby's cues and respond accordingly. (In defense of the books, most of them say the same thing!)

I used to joke that I needed to progress from taking care of plants to taking care of a pet before I would be ready to take care of a baby. It looks like my little joke is coming true!

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Grow Your Own Straweberries

I'm a sucker for kits. There's just something so appealing about having everything you need in one place with step-by-step directions about how to do it.

I got lured by a grow-your-own-strawberries kit when I went to Lowe's to get the magnetic primer and chalkboard paint for the window project I'm working on. I just have such an urge to plant, plant, plant, but I don't really know what I'm doing.

I followed the directions as closely as possible, but it looks like crud. Oh well. I'll keep my fingers crossed!

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Tomato Seeds

Hooray! It's time to start planting seeds (at least in Houston it is...).

According to Year Round Vegetables, Fruits and Flowers for Metro Houston, it's time to plant tomato seeds indoors. I used those expanding peat moss seed growing things. They are fun to watch expand!

Perhaps I should not actually feature my gardening endeavors on this blog, since I have pretty much no idea what I am doing. I try to read books as much as I can, but when those books tell me things I don't want to hear, then I'm forced to ignore them. For example, apparently, you need to raise tomato seeds under fluorescent lights instead by a window. Well, we don't have fluorescent lights in our house, and I'm not about to buy some for our little tomato project.

We also have little to no light around our house, so I'm trying to figure out where to put a raised bed. I think my best bet will be on the west side of the house, but I'll have to ask my neighbor for permission to let the beds slip a little onto his property. It shouldn't be an issue, since the house is pretty much abandoned, and he only stops by once in a while to mow the lawn.

Crossing my fingers!

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