Garden: Year 1

One of the aspects of home ownership that we were most excited about was that we could start a garden. We made an attempt at container gardening in our apartment, but everything died because 

A) we ignored the fact that we were starting in the heat of summer  

B) we used the cheapest soil that Walmart sold, and 

C) the neighbor's cat might have been peeing on the plants. 

Ok, that last theory is completely unsupported. The neighbor had a very nice one-eyed cat that probably never peed on our plants.

ANYWAYS, we did some research about planting times when we moved into the house and started seeds for tomato, bell pepper, lettuce, and basil in January. We had some of the cheapo potting soil leftover from our previous gardening attempt, so we put that in egg cartons and planted some seeds. 

We also got some green onion from the grocery store and stuck it in a cup of water in the window. Anyone who isn't doing this already should do it- you cut back the green leaves and they just grow back over and over. No dirt required- just a cup of water and light.

We quickly lost faith in the egg cartons. You could tell by looking at the soil that it was no bueno- it was super coarse, almost mulch-like. So we shelled out a whopping $7 for a seed starter kit. It came with a tray and bunch of these poker chip looking disks that expand when you soak them in water. They are on the left in the picture below. We moved the operation to the study, where we set up the "Germination Station." We eventually moved the lamp to clip onto the window blinds and used fishing line to tie it up to a good angle for more consistent lighting. Yes, we are huge nerds. Germination station was Aaron's favorite place in the house while it was there- he checked up on our little plantskees multiple times a day. 

We got a few sprouts out of the egg cartons, but none of them grew more than a centimeter or so. Also Aaron dropped one of them on the floor. It's a good thing we got the soil pellet things going when we did. They were super convenient and almost all of them sprouted and grew to a pretty good size. 

We failed at pictures for the next few months... this next one is from early August. The vines sprawling out of the bed are cantaloupe. We planted them from seed straight in the ground in May and they did GREAT with the Arizona heat. Unfortunately we lost half of the melons because they all ripened super fast while we were on vacation and were rotten when we got back. The ones that we did get to eat were super sweet and delicious. They had a much thinner rind than the ones you buy in the store. 

The vines crawling up the wall are grapes. We got a cutting from someone at church and felt pretty silly planting it because it looked like just a stick. No roots or anything. 

And that brings us today! We are getting our second wave of tomatoes. We made some tomato cages out of coat hangers, but they weren't strong enough and we now have a super dense tomato jungle. We didn't ever prune them back and planted them fairly close together. We'll get actual cages next year. 

The bell peppers didn't do nearly as well as the tomatoes- the heat was harder on them. But we have gotten a few small peppers, many many tomatoes, and unlimited green onion. We had some lower quality spinach and lettuce earlier in the summer. It didn't do all that great. We also have 3 oranges growing on our dwarf navel orange tree. What a cutie. 

The grape vines are doing pretty well, even though we didn't get any grapes this year. We survived an onslaught of Grape Leaf Skeletonizers. It's an apt name for these cute little caterpillars. They REALLY like grape leaves, but didn't touch any of our other plants. We would go out there and kill 50-100 of them per day for a good week. They would have completely annihilated the whole vine if we hadn't fought them off. They disappeared a few weeks ago and the vine has made a comeback. 

RUTHLESS MONSTERS. We really would find that many under a single leaf.  

We planted our winter seeds at the beginning of October. We have beets, carrots, and swiss chard sprouts. SeedsNow.com sent us a free sample of Kale seeds so we put those in too, but the jury is still out on whether or not any of them will make it. We didn't bother with the Germination Station this time because the weather is nice. We'll see how it goes!