Not Quite Mrs. Green Thumb

Early in the Spring, I announced that I had decided to grow a lilac - not on my person, but in my yard.  Just the mention of lilac was enough to send Checkered into convulsions as he remembered a former lilac of ours.  It grew without restraint and I avoided it simply by not going on that side of the house.  So my memories of it differ vastly from Checkered's. We eventually sold the lilac and the house it obscured and moved to a flowering shrubless yard.

When I saw the ad for a reblooming lilac and the promised continual and large blooms, it was pay day so my restraint meter was perhaps a little lower than one might hope, and I was soon the owner of a microscopic lilac.

Since my farming venture last year produce maybe five tomatoes and a dozen ears of corn, I decided to forego that grand scheme this year and the lilac found a new home in the abandoned 3 x 5 foot plot.

It went in and then I forgot it for a month minute, and by the time I remember that I owned a lilac plant, it was lost in a forest of thriving weeds.  I was tempted to leave the weeds to their folly since they danced nicely in the wind and since Pepper and the neighbor dog seemed to enjoy snacking on them. 

The next day, as my neighbor surreptitiously and continually glanced at my weed ocean, I was overcome with guilt and handled it just as I handle any other pressure:  I ate lots of ice cream and went to bed at 8, hoping things would resolve themselves by the next morning.

That policy worked beautiful until yesterday when Checkered and our kids were all out working in the yard and I was forced by reason of guilt to do something about the weeds before Checkered used the weed-whacker on them and my $23 plant.

By virtue of sweat, and with my posterior pointed at my neighbor's house - so much easier than actually kneeling - I weeded and sweated and weeded.  Since ice cream and early sleep didn't make my weeds disappear, I rolled out weed barrier and spread mulch.

And now, may I introduce you to my reblooming lilac?

 With any luck, it will grow beyond  its current three inch height and will give Checkered something to anguish over in years to come.

Someday…

Someday this

will become this:

Someday this

will become this:

We just wish we knew what this will become someday:

Tuesday's Trivia: CORN

Naysayers aside, we grew corn this year! While we delight in our ten corn plants, here's a little corn trivia for you:

*One bushel of corn will sweeten more than 400 cans of pop.
*A bushel of corn fed to livestock produces 5.6 pounds of retail beef, 13 pounds of retail pork, 32 pounds of chicken, or 28 pounds of catfish.
*Farmers grow corn on every continent except Antarctica.
*The main ingredient in most dry pet food is corn.
*The corn cob (ear) is actually part of the corn plant’s flower.
*Each tassel on a corn plant releases as many as 5 million grains of pollen.
*There are about 600 kernels on each ear of corn.
*Pioneers planted 4 corn kernels for every plant they hoped to harvest: "1 for the maggot, 1 for the crow, 1 for the cutworm, and 1 to grow".
*The corn plant has both male and female parts. The silk is the female part while the tassel is the male part.

Source: http://www.cyberspaceag.com/kansascrops/corn/corntrivia.htm

Topsy Turvy Gardeners We Are

The pickiest eaters in the universe live in this house. Horrible. Terrible. Finicky. Fussy. If something remotely healthy gets beyond their lips and into the mouth, well, the result is ugly.

We've bribed. We've threatened. We've punished. We've even lied to them about the food actually not being healthy. Nevertheless, the picky eaters continue to live here, and I worry about what will become of their health and bodies as they grow and life's stresses get more intense.

Our doctors have told me not to worry. They've also told me to worry. They've said to give the kids vitamins and other minerals, and they've said to not give them anything.

But last winter I read an article that said that when kids grow their own food, they eat it.

And that is the answer to the question several people have asked me. Why, after all these years, have I decided to attempt a garden?

We bought some topsy turvies and planted tomatoes, quickly dying cucumbers, and a mystery food. We think we might be growing yellow squash there. We also are trying to coax some strawberries out of hibernation. Into a small garden plot went a little corn and some surprise fruit. It's a garden without rhyme or reason, and that makes it perfect for us.

My thinking is that if none of the plants produce any food, my family will still be ahead. You see, my children will have at least touched a green plant with the potential to produce healthy food. And we shall take progress where ever it's available.

Water IS Expensive, You Know

A few years ago, I was flower hunting.  As I drove up the street where my kids' schools are, on the left was a moderately-sized nursery.  But on my right was a very small greenhouse with a VISA sign hanging out front.  I love underdogs and I never carry cash, so the decision was easy.

Eventually I made my way through the plants and realized that I was totally lost.  The proprietor offered his assistance and I told him my woes of failing to keep any plant alive longer than a minute.  He then asked me what my habits were.  It was a strange question and an odd turn to the conversation, but I quickly reviewed my habits:  eating ice cream with a fork, putting one sock and shoe on before the second sock and shoe, rocking myself to sleep, and so on.  Just as I was about to confess all these habits to him, I heard him again asking about my WATERING habits.

 I answered.  But I didn't want him to think I was a bad gardener, so I actually greatly inflated the number of waterings I really gave my plants.

  He said, "How odd.  You see, most people understand that plants are living things and need water sometimes.  Why are you hellbent of starving your plants to death?"

He laughed. I didn't.

****

The original purpose of this post was to announce that we planned to plant a garden this year - my first.  After rereading this, perhaps it is best if I announce that we may try a single tomato plant.