As Promised

Here are some pictures from last year's garden.

The cucumbers that never were. I couldn't keep them watered enough, the pots were too small. They grew long and thin and never made cucumbers longer than an inch. Then they were attacked by tiny spiders and were covered with a thin veil of web, which essentially blocked out the sun and killed them. All rather horrific. I decided not to try cucumbers on the patio this year. I'll wait until I can plant some in the ground. The tiny little sprouts are strawberries. I barely got strawberries, but I'm expecting that this year those plants will produce fruit.


These were the first fruits. Mini chocolate bell peppers, a mini red bell pepper, and very small carrots. The carrots eventually grew much larger and were quite tasty. I'll be planting those again this year. I'm going to let them have the whole pot this time instead of having them share with the green onions (which weren't very successful). I also used the carrot greens in stir fry for a little green addition and my plan is to use it this year in place of parsley. The mini bell peppers were great stuffed with cream cheese and herbs and baked.


This is the new patio in the process of the move. We kept our books on the porch for the first couple weeks. On the left are some of the bell pepper plants. On the right are the green onions and the carrots. Carrots make a lot of green.


On the right is one of the mini bell pepper plants. On the right is the California Wonder bell pepper plant. I had three of those. They don't grow nearly as large in a container as you find in the grocery store. However, they were a great size for a household of two. I have some strategies for my garden this year that might allow for bigger produce, or at least more of it.

That's the gist of it. In the end it was quite wild looking. I'm sure it will be even crazier this next year. Today I planted Broad Leaf Sage and Helen Mount Violas seeds in my window sill starter garden. Technically the Violas weren't supposed to be started indoors, but they are such a year round adaptable flower as far as I can tell that I decided to satisfy my impatience. It was a snowy day and it promises to be a cold week. Come this weekend it should warm up and I think I'll plant some of the seeds outside that are supposed to be able to be started outside before the last frost. That makes me nervous, but I'm trying to trust the seed packets. You have to start somewhere.