tomatoes

Last year was the very first time in my life I have planted tomatoes. My hubby built me a raised bed last year and I planted a few cherry tomato plants. It was fun to go out everyday to see if any cherry tomatoes were growing.

This year I thought it went so well that instead of planted 4, I'd plant 11 in the same amount of spacing. I knew there were rules on how close you could plant them, but I thought hey...the more the merrier. Plus I want to plant as many tomato plants as I can so I can make salsa and hopefully tomato sauce. My goal really is to become self-sufficient as much as possible. I'm hoping to grow things that we eat a lot of. We eat salsa at least once a week, and tomato sauce once a week as well. So we'll see how much salsa/tomato sauce I can generate with 11 plants. 

I planted a few different kinds of tomatoes. I planted one row of hybrids and one row of heirlooms. I didn't know till after I brought them home what the difference was. According to Lowes.com: 

Heirloom tomatoes are old varieties grown from seed saved from season to season. Heirlooms are a category unto themselves. They tend to be less disease resistant and "wilder" in appearance. Fans insist that their flavor and uniqueness make up for any disadvantages.

Hybrid tomatoes are developed to give growers the best characteristics of all varieties. Fruit size, crop yield and disease resistance are all traits of hybrids.

When I first planted the tomato plants I put the cages on them so they'll go big and tall in the cage. I put the cages on them just the way I bought them from the store with the big side down....until I posted my proud picture on facebook and one of my more experienced gardener friends asked me what my secret tip was to putting them upside down like that. Ha! I had no idea they were upside down. How embarrassing! I turned them around the right way.

The tomato plants after I first planted them with the cages the wrong way...

My eldest child posing with the tomato plants with the cages the right way.

They've been growing for 1 month and I'm seeing so many tomatoes growing! I am now starting to understand why the guidelines are to plant the tomatoes a bit apart. They are getting so big, I am having a hard time seeing in between the plants.

The Dancing cucumber

I'm not sure if any of you remember my last post about my cucumbers...but they didn't end well for me. The ants came in and enjoyed my plant. However after I wrote that I didn't pull the plant. I left it. I figured I'll pull it once it's completely dead and brown. It never completely turned dead and brown. I had the surprise of my life this week, when I went outside and spotted a CUCUMBER on the vine! My cucumber plant miraculously survived. I literally jumped up and down and shouted "WOHOO! I didn't kill my plant!"I couldn't believe it.

Can you spot my lone cucumber?

Every time I talk about my cucumbers I always think of Veggie tales and the Dance of the cucumber song. I figured it was best to share that video, than one of my attempt at singing that song. haha.

So if you think something is far beyond help/repair, don't count it out. It might surprise you. Like my cucumber coming back from what I thought was dead.  Another gardening lesson from the newbie gardner.

To Melon or Not to Melon? --that is the question

To Melon or Not to Melon? -- that is the question

I bought a small starter cantaloupe plant from our home depot a few months ago. It actually was one of the first fruits/veggies I ever purchased to plant. I had no idea how it was going to grow. I had no idea how long it would take to get cantaloupes. I just was excited every day to walk out my door and look in my garden and watch the changes. Then one day the cantaloupe plant took over the entire garden! It's a vine and it started wrapping itself around all my other plants including my rose bush. A couple weeks later we walked outside and I spotted a golf ball sized cantaloupe growing on the vine! So exciting! It was no where near the size of cantaloupes you see in the grocery store...but this cantaloupe was special since I grew it!

We waited patiently for it to grow and after a crazy week of rain my cantaloupe was moldy and rotten. All that work, for NOTHING:(

So this past week I went out to the garden and not only did I have one cantaloupe growing, not two, not three but four!!!!! Not only did I have four cantaloupes growing (of various sizes) but the vine was turning brown. I know that sign. I've seen my squash plant, and cucumber plant vines turn brown. It means it's about to go. What I don't know is WHY the vine all of sudden starts to die and turn brown.



So my choices with a vine turning brown with my four cantaloupes on it:

1. If I leave the cantaloupes they'll probably die too with the vine.
2. If I pick them, they might not be ready to be eaten.

So it didn't seem like I had much of a choice, keep the cantaloupes, or loose them. So I picked them all...and I was glad I did. The vines were completely brown and dead.

I brought them inside and decided to cut one up. I asked my hubby if he'd like a piece and said "I don't like cantaloupe." I couldn't believe it, we had been growing these for MONTHS and MONTHS. I responded "I don't like cantaloupe either! I bought these because I thought you did!"

So I had been carefully growing these beautiful cantaloupes for....wait for it.......NO ONE! hahaha!

I think I might cut them up, freeze them and put them in smoothies. I gave one away to my dad since he does like cantaloupes.

Lesson learned:

• I now know how cantaloupes grow
• I now know I should probably only buy fruits/veggies to grow that my family enjoys and that doesn't include cantaloupes.

Is that a goat in your garage?

Is that a goat in your garage? If so you must've read "urban farming"...is what it said on the back of the book jacket of the latest book I just finished reading.  What an intriguing thought....a goat in my garage, really? What kind of a book is this, that would inspire me to get a goat? --I thought.

I ordered it from Amazon for $16. It's a helpful book based on the experiences of a family who wanted to live more off the land than to spend most of their money commercially in the stores.  The chapters go through each kind of food we normally eat or purchase from the grocery store and how to make better choices. In the beginning of each chapter Annette (one of the authors) lists her original grocery list and now what she purchases at the store. For example in the grain chapter:
Original List:

• baking powder
• baking soda
• bread
• breakfast cereal
• crackers
• croutons
• flour
• frozen pizza
• frozen waffles
• hotdog buns
• oatmeal
• pancake mix
• salt
• yeast

Revised List:

• baking powder
• baking soda
• local grains
• salt
• yeast

It's so neat to see the progression she has made towards a greener life. Some of the chapters include: grain, chicken & the egg, dairy dilemma, growing your own, eating seasonally, preserving harvest, raising small animals for meat, soaps & sundries, just to name a few!

I loved reading about her journey. I am on the same journey of greener living. I never thought of myself as an urban farmer. However the title grabbed my attention because I want to live my best life with what God has given me. I find that local organic food can be pricey at times. I know it would be cheaper to grow my own....but the question I found myself asking as I read this book was "how far was I willing to take this?"

In every chapter there's a spot called "Opportunity for Change" for example in "The Chicken and the egg" chapter the are 3 different opportunities for change:

1. buy organic free range eggs
2. buy organic pasturized eggs from the farmers market
3. get your own chickens

I found myself evaluating why we do what we do, and what's the best choice for my family. For example with the eggs. We already are doing #1, we buy organic greenwise eggs from publix.  We definitely could buy eggs from the farmers market, it's just a 45 minute drive from our house on a saturday morning. The third option my husband and I actually talked a lot about after reading this chapter. Could we get chickens? What would our neighbors think? Would our two miniature schnauzers try to eat them? Would they keep us up all night? Then we thought, it would be neat to see the chickens grow, get fresh eggs....but the chicken would probably make a mess, they probably stink, they're probably a lot of work...so the conclusion we made was: we'll continue to buy our organic eggs from the store. Perhaps we'll try #2 and actually buy them from a farmer, or from the farmers market. We'll see! So it's a no on chickens (for now).   What I loved about this book is it had me considering all the options, and not feeling like I have no control of where I get my food and how it's processed. I can be part of process!

The idea of a goat in the garage is hysterical! The goat provides milk, but she warned about the goat being destructive and pulling siding off your house. I am absolutely 100% sure we're not getting a goat.

However she highly encouraged knowing where you food comes from and being part of the process. There are many ways she's doing this, that I can't do (or I choose not to do). I am really excited about the following ideas that I want to eventually try at my house in the coming months.

Here's what I plan to do:

1. Getting a wheat grinder attachment for my kitchen aid mixer to grind my own wheat KitchenAid Stand Mixer Attachment Grain Mill - KGM (Google Affiliate Ad)
2. buying eggs at the farmers market
3. Canning. I'm so excited to try canning (tomato sauce, salsa, jam, fruit, applesauce, pickles to name a few)
4. turning most of my land into a space to grow food. Like fruit trees, vines growing that grow grapes or kiwis, a plentiful herb garden. (she has a whole chapter to help you figure out what produce your family eats most of, and then figuring out how much you need to plant each season. That's such an organized way to garden! I love that idea)
5. composting (i'm still really not sure about this one. I know it's good for the soil, I know it's good to use my leftover table scraps...just not sure about the bugs and stink! I can buy a bag of manure that'll hopefully have the same effect on my garden for $2 at home depot)
6. making my own tea from my garden

So even though there are some ideas in this book that I can't fathom doing (like killing my own hog for meat). I can appreciate and respect the path she's on. I love hearing the heartwarming stories as she experienced trying to live a greener life. I love being on that same journey and I too am going to continue to expand my horizon and find more ways to have Green Moments.

Want to learn more? Annette Cottrell has a blog: sustainableeats.com

Lemon Tree

Have you ever walked into a store for one thing, and walked out with something completely different? I was walking into Home Depot last week for paint, to paint my crib to bench. While I was waiting for my paint to be mixed I moseyed on down to the garden section. I always like to see what new types of fruits of veggies are in season to plant. As I'm on the journey of learning how to garden, so I figured I would check out their latest selection for fall. I walked by the fruit trees and most of them are pretty good sizes and are $120 a piece. I've always wanted a fruit tree, but I can't afford that price tag. Especially since I'm not a seasoned gardner; I'd hate to buy something that pricey, only to kill it.

All of a sudden, low and behold: I turned a corner and there was the cutest little lemon tree, with five lemons already on it!  The price tag read $18! How on earth was a lemon tree for sale for only $18? I thought with five lemons already on this tree, it must be in good enough shape. If only five lemons make it, it would be a fun experience to learn about growing lemons and enjoying a few. That would make each lemon cost $3.60, but it'll be fun! (this is what I was telling myself as I was trying to decide if this lemon tree was going home with me).

As I checked out,  the wonderful check out Home Depot ladies oohed and ahhed over my lemon tree. They said "if I had seen that tree, I would've bought it for $18"!  As soon as they said that I felt overjoyed that I won the prize. It solidified that I needed this tree, and it was meant to be. haha.

I asked the wonderful check out Home Depot ladies, "Do you know anything about growing, planting a lemon tree?" They mentioned I need to keep the lemon tree away from frost. That I should not plant it, until after the last frost. I should plan to move my lemon tree inside by the first frost, to not loose it. I'm wondering if that's why you see people with blankets on some of their plants? Maybe I could get a "lemon tree blanket" that I keep in the garage, and when the weather gets chilly I'll run out and cover my little lemon tree?


If my lemon tree takes off. I'll be making lemonade, lemon meringue, and definitely be adding lemons to all my juices I make. I can see myself as a grandma having my grandkids come over and fill a basket full of lemons for them to take home. Okay, well I'm getting carried away. Let's just cross our fingers that the tree makes it through the night and I get to enjoy at least five lemons.

Here's my lemon tree shoved into the front seat of my car. You can see four of the lemons.

I love this picture shows how small it really is, next to my five year old and my two year old. 

How we built the Raised Garden

This is Juan (My hubby)'s 1st blog post! He shared his instructions on how to build a raised vegetable garden so I could share with you. He's so sweet:) I know a few of you had asked "How?" So here's his instructions. Please message me with any other questions you may have and I'll pass them along to the builder (a.k.a Juan). BTW: we didn't use a kit, or instructions from anywhere. Rather I showed him pictures of what I was looking for from Pinterest and low and behold we have a couple raised veggie gardens. He's awesome at figuring stuff like this out.  

Dimensions:

•  6 ft long
• 3 ft wide
• 20 inches high

Supplies:

• 2  - 2 x 10 x 18 ft pressure treated lumber (this makes the sides)
• 3 – 2 x 4 x 10 ft pressure treated lumber (for the top rail)
• box of 2 ½ coarse thread screws

Tools Needed:

•  tape measurer
• skill saw
• drill
• patience
• t square for angles

Approximate build time: an hour 1/2

Instructions:

1.  2x 10 x18 boards cut:  Four 6ft lengths & four 3 ft lengths                                                                                     
2.  Screw the 3 ft lengths onto the ends of the 6ft. Attach the other 6 ft side. (so you make your box). You’ll do that twice.
3. Stack your boxes on top of each other. Then screw them together. The way I did this was with a 2 x4 in each corner. Then screwed the boxes to a 2 x 4.
4.  Then the top rail: cut the 2x4 at 45 degree angle opposing to make a 90 degree angle for the edges.  Screw them on to the top of the box to create the top rail.
5. Fill with dirt, lots and lots of dirt. This could ruin your husband’s back…but you’ll have a beautiful raised veggie garden!

Tomatoes broccoli and lettuce are thriving in this garden right now

That cute mischievous little schnauzer is Jack. He was no help at all in the building process

There's still room for 1 more raised veggie garden way back there

The ants came marching in.

What I find to be extremely exciting about being a new veggie gardener is I have no idea what these veggies are going to look like as they grow.

I planted a cucumber plant in my raised vegetable garden. It became a vine and started growing up my fence.   It was pretty awesome to watch each day as it changed. Then I started to see little yellow flowers all over the vine. Then the little flowers were turning into tiny cucumbers. It was so neat to see. The kids were excited to see them growing too. One day after all the rain I spotted what looked like a tiny gherkin pickle. I thought we're going to have a TON of cucumbers!  I looked down at the stem of the plant and saw ants marching up and down my cucumber plant. The stem looked weak. I lifted it up and noticed the stem was hallow. The ants were eating the stem.....and within a week my whole cucumber plant shriveled up and died. Such a sad day. So we did not enjoy eating any cucumbers from my garden.

These little cucumbers were so cute.

This is as big as any of my cucumbers ever got, before the ants took over!

My poor little cucumber plant. Can you spot the tiny little ants marching up and down this vine? I'm so mad at them.

Those pesky little ants enjoyed my cucumbers...oh the life of a new gardener!

Has anyone every planted cucumbers and actually harvested cucumbers?

Maybe I do have a Green Thumb?

I have never been much of a gardener. I decided earlier in the summer that if I was to work hard at tending to a garden I would love to grow fruits or veggies I could eat. Flowers are really pretty...but with the little free time I have, it wouldn't be enough of an incentive for me to really tend to a garden.  I decided to make the flower bed at the front of the house not just a flower bed, but also a veggie garden!

So I headed to Home Depot & Lowes to look at their potted veggies that were already started. I figured growing from seed was something to try another time. So I  bought 4 pepper plants ( a green, orange, yellow & red). I bought a squash plant, a cantaloupe plant, basil, & mint. I also decided to plant the tops of two pineapples I had purchased at the grocery store.

This is what the garden looked like right after we planted the flowers and veggies in May 2012

I was so proud of my little garden

A couple weeks after planting, I discovered my first pepper! Can you see it? (above)

My first cantaloupe!  Buggies discovered my cantaloupe as well, I hope it was tasty. So I haven't eaten one of my cantaloupes yet.  I have two more growing that I hope we can enjoy soon.

                                               Our 1st Yellow pepper!                                                                   Our 1st Red pepper!

Our basil plant tripled in size since I purchased it.

We've already harvested 1/2 a dozen peppers. We really haven't needed to water the plants much since it's been raining everyday this summer!

Our garden September 2012

It grew so fast!  What a difference a couple months makes!

Raised Vegetable Garden

What do you do during your 1st born's 1st day of Kindergarten? Well you build a raised Vegetable garden of course! So we did!  When I say "we" I mean Juan. He built the vegetable garden and I went to Lowes and bought vegetable plants!

Since I am not really an avid gardener (yet)...I started to research vegetable gardens online. Pinterest became my best friend.   The best advice I found was: 'To just do it. That you'll figure it out along the way'. I have no idea how long it takes for my veggies to grow. I know they need water, and sun. I know I need to pull weeds if I see them. I also know that I don't want to use any pesticides of any kind. I'm excited to grow my own vegetables, and to know exactly where they came from. It doesn't get any fresher than this!  I'll definitely post again on the status of my veggies. Hopefully they'll make it to the dinner table!

Don't you love my big gulp drink sitting the garden? I definitely was working up a sweat planting all those new plants in the new garden! Tomato plants on the left. Lettuce in the middle. Broccoli on the right. Romaine lettuce is the far back right. 

So why am I wanting a raised vegetable garden?  A few reasons.

1. Grass and weeds have a harder time growing in the raised garden, as opposed to a garden on the ground.

2. It's easy to tend when it's raised, so I don't have to bend down to care for it.

3. The dogs and other critters have a harder time getting to it, since it isn't on the ground.

My cherry tomato plants.  Do you spot a cute little boy's hand in the picture? That's my little Ethan. 

We bought umpteen bags of soil to fill the raised veggie garden. I can't wait to plant more veggies!  The rest of the veggies are going to be planted by seeds.   I'll post more on growing my veggies by seed another time.


My goal is to have three raised vegetable gardens side by side with paver stones in between them, so we don't have to mow in between the gardens. (when I saw 'we' of course I mean Juan )

Organic Food Delivered?

Until I'm able to have a more bountiful garden I found a GREAT way to get fresh organic produce. While I was visiting the Alternative Health Food Store in Pace, I discovered a company called "OFF the VINE"

http://www.offthevine.org/

They claim to "Bring the Farmers Market to you." There's no delivery fee. They promise to deliver only Organic Produce weekly. They only deliver what you order. You can have a standing order for each week, or you can have a different order each week. There's no commitment. Sounded promising!

I placed an order for a Mixed Vegetable and Fruit Box Share. It's supposed to be enough for a family of 2-4 for a week. The order has to be placed by midnight on Sunday night and I have to pick up my order at the Alternative Health Food store tomorrow on Wednesday between 3-6pm. I'm excited to see what the box looks like and how much produce is in it. I should be expecting: Spring onions, bok choy, yellow crooked neck squash,green beans, carrots with tops, romaine lettuce, broccoli, white button mushrooms, collard greens, Anjou pears, Fuji apples, Ruby grapefruit, Minneola tangerines and strawberries! 

One word: YUM!

Green Thumb? ...we'll see:)

I was a week of firsts for me. I am trying to find ways to live healthier and better.

I was excited to try my hand at gardening. I love organic produce, but I definitely don't always love the price of it. I usually get my produce from the Palofox Farmers Market, Everman and Publix to shop for the cheapest prices.  I figured why not try to grow my favorites at home. There was only one problem with my solution...everything I've EVER tried to grow dies. I decided to try to grow only a few things and see how it goes.

I headed to Home Depot and decided to browse their herbs and veggies. 

I decided on Strawberries,  a key lime tree, cilantro, mint, basil & lavender. 

I planted the key lime tree in a pot. There are 56 tiny key lime buds on the tree.

 I planted the mint, cilantro, basil & Lavender all in one pot together.

 I planted the strawberry plant in a separate pot. I decided later to go back to Home Depot and get a couple more small strawberry plants to add to the pot.

I placed them all near my front door in hopes this would help me to remember water and tend them.

The most rewarding moment was when we had friends over last night for Taco Night and it was so wonderful to actually serve some items from my garden. We had fresh cilantro and limes from my garden in our tacos! Pretty cool. Especially because I've never served food from my garden!

The next step is to clear our a whole flower bed and plant some produce from seeds and watch the grow! I hope it all works out!