In the beginning

So yeah, I wasn't going to go there. I guess as my first post, this would be a good time to kinda go over whats going on up till now. I'm Mommy, and I have a 4 yo Daughter we shall call Pooka. She's a sweet and curious girl so when she asked to know more about plants, well I obliged.

So Pooka and I started a garden (which seems easier then starting this post). Most everything began as seed that Pooka placed on seed starters. Some took, some didn't. Some took much better then others. But in the end, we have plants.

We currently have out there from seed:

Big Tomatoes (Real scientific there huh)
Green beans
Cherry Tomatoes
Cucumbers
Sweet Peppers
Green peppers
Broccolli
Cilantro
Sunflowers
Morning Glories
SnapDragons



Since then, due to either not growing from seed starters, or wanting instant results, we now have:

Parsley
Oregano
Basil
Strawberry plant
2 Pablano pepper plants




And today I went to the store to buy some chives and came home with a second Strawberry plant for $3. Its perfectly fine, but its starting to get  to the end of the time for planting them and the nursery wanted them gone. And seeds for chives which may or may not grow, but its better then the empty pot we had for green onions (We think Daddy accidently watered the onions too hard and threw them out of the pot).

Something we litterally started 2 days ago was celery.  I heard that you could grow celery if you just chop the end off (as you normally would for breaking it down) and place it in the ground. So I did. We are waiting to see what happens there.

So far the results are kinda spotty. We have only gotten 2 Green Beans (Off a plant I had started to give up as a casualty of me, but its coming back) and alot of cilantro out of the thing, but everything is blooming like mad.  I guess I should try and remind myself here that its still early. That it's only the first Tues of June (as the tornado sirens reminded me this morning). This is earlier then I have gotten things before, but I think its also I am actively watching it instead of throwing in the ground then wondering what that is a month later. That whole watched pot thing. Although the Cilantro is flowering so I may end up with Coriander as well.


Oh and this is a picture of Pooka's first Morning Glory, it lasted about 4 hours before a rain storm came and beat the tar out of it. There are other buds on the plant as you can see in the picture. (Let the record show, I don't know why we planted a flower that I can't eat. That darn thing is a pain since its tried to climb the cilantro, the deck, the tomatoes. I am pretty sure if Pooka looks at it too long, I will need shears to get her out. Its behaving better with a trellis, but I have my eye on it).

Now to be completely honest, I don't know a darn thing about what I am doing and I am hoping here that Mother Nature will make up for where I seem to kill things. I know Pooka has a green thumb since I couldn't grow a thing before she started helping me.

If you have any advice, I would love to hear it. Granted most of these pictures show containers, but alot of the bigger plants (tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers) are in the ground in a quasi-raised bed/planting bed all around my deck. Even with our yard being larger, we have a big dog and 2 kids so play space is essential (And if I put a giant garden in it, it means everything in it will get trampled at least once.)

Oh and anyone with a good Kid friendly/safe pesticide or repellent I would appreciate. The peppers are getting  picked on since they are still small (Gotta remember to start those earlier). All I can say is the leaves are being eaten, and there are some small type of bug flying around. Beyond that, no clue.

Maybe next update will have pictures of the peppers and the landscaped planter bed. Don't know when that will be, but apparently I have a blog now. Thanks for checking us out.