Garden Update, Late April, 2022

4/26/2022

April has zoomed by! The days have slipped through my fingers like sand.

It's early yet, but we are really enjoying our garden.

Due to our home's damage wrought by harsh weather in 2021, we did not host our family’s Easter celebration last year. This year we were back and we wanted everything to be ready.

The biggest improvement to our back garden was the rebuilding and enlarging of our raised beds. Joseph worked nights and weekends to finish them in time. And then we had seven yards of excellent soil delivered.

When we lived on acreage, we had a trailer and could haul soil wherever we wanted. Here, on our tiny dot of property, even a wheelbarrow can be too big. I have a sturdy gardening wagon and my clever husband fashioned a cart that could hold several plastic containers. We considered hiring help to transport the soil from driveway to back garden, but one fine weekend – the weather was gloriously cool and sunny – we opted to do it ourselves.

I have to say, it felt great.

Comically, I decided sort of last minute -- way too late to be ready for Easter -- to try growing vegetables and some flowers by seed. I don’t even know how much I’ve spent on annuals through the years, but it’s certainly in the thousands. I've always felt a bit silly and guilty about it. This year, to increase my angst, I could not find the bedding plants I was looking for in time for the holiday. It was slim pickings indeed. Something in me snapped.

“You’re a gardener! Grow your own plants!”

Obviously, sections of colorful annuals don't grow from seed overnight or even in a couple of weeks. But I was determined to not buy flats of flowerless plants. We would just have to get by.

That’s not to say that I didn’t go to nurseries near and far. I did, and insofar as trees and shrubs go, I did just fine. We now have two elderberry bushes/trees. I’m so excited! We’re going to have to keep them as shrub-like as possible. I'm really hoping that's possible. They are looking quite exuberant! We also have a new grapevine, one persimmon, one pomegranate, and a baby jujube.

Flowers, in the meantime, are enjoying the relatively mild weather as much as we are. Some of them will be "giant plants" by late July while the roses will be in survival mode. But for now, everything looks happy and fresh.

I will try to update soon! I have so much to tell you about my vegetable experiments!

Happy Gardening!

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Our Garden

For years, my husband and I worked at creating a series of gardens on our four-acre lot in a rural, Texas subdivision west of Houston. I have to say, it was a fantastic experience. Now, I have a pocket garden on a golf course.

And I am busier than ever. Gardening in southeast Texas can be brutal.

I plot and plan. I work under dangerous conditions. I am frequently under assault. At times, I might drop everything and run for cover. I strive to work towards the greater good.

I plan my garden beds and seasonal rotations, but I also know to expect the unexpected -- from the weather, nature, even, perhaps especially, from myself.

Heat, humidity, and potentially disease-carrying mosquitoes are problems for more than half the year and a dangerous combination in summer. That’s to say nothing of fire ants and other biting, stinging insects.

Snakes, too, although they only make a rare appearance in my little garden. Poison ivy and oak love it here and birds sow both generously.

Speaking of unwelcome plants, we have some seriously persistent, aggressive weeds like Bermuda grass and nutsedge.

Despite some uncomfortable conditions, I feel very protective of the wild in my garden. It’s important to know friend from foe, for example, venomous from nonvenomous snakes and even then, it’s often not necessary to engage.

As for the bugs, it is not fine with us to hurt the good with the bad. Pesticides are banned. So are herbicides. Our beds, whether food or ornamental, are organic. And while our garden isn’t entirely native, we do have plenty of native plants that please the local wildlife as well as ourselves.

I’ve learned that a small garden is as much a balm to the soul as a large one and can keep the gardener just as busy.

It took me a while to adjust, but I love it. While every garden is different, they all offer challenges, pleasures, time with nature. Much like people, they have their good days and bad days, high seasons and low; and they can all be fun and beautiful if you love them enough.

Garden Warrior
Be like the flower, turn your face to the sun.
-- Gibran Khalil Gibran