Green Thumb???

I promised no excuses for lags in this blog and I will stick to that promise. The Roberson household has had an exciting and crazy few weeks. I will chronicle the highlights in the next couple of posts, but today I think I will share with you a new side project that we have begun.

When Eli and I lived in Baltimore we shared a 3rd floor apartment in a nice area. However, as any past or present apartment dweller can attest, your yard more often than not is a concrete slab balcony. We missed having green at our doorstep, so we decided to create a balcony garden. I originally envisioned a few planters with mixed flowers just to pretty things up. Eli however, had ambitions to grow vegetables, particularly tomatoes, though some other veggies were attempted. This garden had varying degrees of success. We actually did get a few tomatoes out of Eli's hard work, but dealing with less than ideal conditions meant only a few plants ever thrived.

Fast forward to last summer when we bought our house. One of the features we were attracted to was the decent sized front yard and large back yard. We immediately saw endless potential for flower and vegetable gardening. Of course, I was 7 months pregnant when we moved in July, and between unpacking and preparing for Will's arrival we were lucky to get the lawn mowed. So our dreams of gardening were put on hold.

I should stop at this point acknowledge an important piece of information. Neither Eli nor I have any real experience gardening. My Gran maintained lovely gardens around the house, but any lessons she attempted to give were wasted on my youth and then disinterest. Eli's grandfather did some farming, but he passed away when Eli was fairly young. So we are charging into this project largely uneducated. I checked out 3 books on gardening from the local library just to try and figure out some basics.

Despite our lack of experience, we have some pretty grand plans for our gardens. We actually started with some flowering trees that Eli received through a donation to the Arbor Day Foundation. We planted half of those last Wednesday, and will finish planting in the next couple of days. I have decided to try azalea bushes in the beds that run across the front of our house, with some perennial flowers in the front of those beds to fill in until the bushes get some growth. I am also going to plant a mix of perennials in the beds around our front tree and mailbox. I really want to plant all kinds of bulbs- tulips, daffodils, crocus, etc- but have to wait until the fall to do that. This is all very ambitious for me, so if I can manage to keep most of it alive I will consider it a major victory.

The backyard is going to be the main event. Eli has a huge vegetable garden in mind, and I am excited to see it grow. I know for sure he is going to try several varieties of tomatoes, sweet peppers and banana peppers, onions, and green beans. He has several other possible additions that I am not sure if he has decided on yet, but I know he is also planning to make me a little herb garden. I have dreams of these vegetables and the yummy things I can make with them. I think for both of us we are excited to have a project to work on. I have been looking for ways to feel more productive and active, and Eli has a strong desire to work on a project that has a clear end result. Hopefully between the two of us we have at least one green thumb.