Come In And Visit ...
We vegetable garden every year!!!
Gardening And Us...
Gardening means different things to different people. Thousands view gardening as a hobby, a relaxing escape from the pressures of an urban environment.
For us, the food produced may be almost secondary. Growing fresh vegetables, herbs, or fruits provides a great sense of joy and accomplishment.
And we get a chance to giggle at the Chartier's in Connecticut where the ground at Easter time is just beginning to thaw out!
We grow year around. Visit us yearly:
Working in the dirt is relaxing! Before we retired, coming home and taking out the hostilities by pulling the weeds was great.
Now, post retirement, we can get up in the morning, stroll the garden, and discover they new growth, new buds forming and enjoy watching the garden grow!
What do we do with the vegetables....duh! We cook them! If you have not had fresh swiss chard, broccoli, or cauliflower.... you haven't lived!
It's absolutely the truth
Quotes We Enjoy
Quotation To Remember:
My green thumb came only as a result of the mistakes I made while learning to see things from the plant's point of view. ~H. Fred Ale
Gardening requires lots of water - most of it in the form of perspiration. ~Lou Erickson
What a man needs in gardening is a cast-iron back, with a hinge in it. ~Charles Dudley Warner
Horticulture
For those who are not familiar with the term, horticulture is defined as the art or science of cultivating fruits, flowers, and vegetables (Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary, Unabridged).
Horticulture is a composite science with strongest influence from plant physiology and pathology, botany, biology, chemistry, soil science, and genetics.
Other sciences are involved, but the ones listed readily come to mind at this writing.
Helpful Pets
When we had all of our babies, tey would come out and help! You have not laughed until yhou see a five pound chihuahua try to drag in a ten pound piece of broccoli! Flower and her tomatoes and strawberries just brought joy to our lives! Sarge would lounge outside supervising us!
Just kidding guys!
Vegetables; A Definition
Vegetable is a culinary term which generally refers to an edible part of a plant. The definition is traditional rather than scientific and is somewhat arbitrary and subjective. All parts of herbaceous plants eaten as food by humans, whole or in part, are normally considered vegetables. Mushrooms, though belonging to the biological kingdom fungi, are also commonly considered vegetables. In general, vegetables are thought of as being savory, and not sweet, although there are many exceptions.
We grow everything here and more!
Every Inch? Judge For Yourself!
This used to be a patio area with a hot tub...
Now it is 800+ square feet of garden!
- March 2010
Farmer Paul pulls our a beet! That there is a beet!
- May 2009
Yes... We do many potted plants like blueberries!
We get blueberries for months. - May 2009
"Flower beds" once upon a time...
About 250 square feet along in inside walls
- May 2010
From entrance way surrounded by fruit treets
and herbs plus potted strawberries!
- June 2007
Yes... Sue is picking cantelopes from the grapefruit tree...
It's a long story
- July 2007
The south wall garden is loaded with tomatoes and squash
- June 2005
Our front? Apples, avacados, onions, oranges,
zucchini, potatoes, plumns, kumquats...
- May 2009
Down the driveway in 2003....The plum tree on the left is 25 feet tall now
- June 2003
Poppy gets help from the troops! Pinky in front and Flower, Sarge,
and Mickey bringing up the rear
They are on a hunt for strawberries and tomatoes
- July 2004
May 2006 the artichokes are going wild!
- May 2006
Mickey (the Man Boy) is always in the yard looking for goodies to devour!
- May 2006
It also hard work... Spreading last years compost all over the garden
- January 2008
Not all the work is outside.... Sue is making
home made
sauerkraut from out cabbage!
- April 2011
I am not afraid anymore
What was The Biggest Problem??? Adobe!
The dirt in our yard was "adobe"... Hard as a rock! Water would float on it! The first small garden we started had to be dug with an axe to break up the soil. Over the next 4-5 years, we added compost, imported soil, and dug under the previous years veggie left-overs back into the soil! Finally we now have extremely rich soil, well drained, and can grow almst anything!
Did You Know? - The word adobe /əˈdoʊbiː/ has existed for around 4,000 years, with relatively little change in either pronunciation or meaning. The word can be traced from the Middle Egyptian (c. 2000 BC) word dj-b-t "mud [i.e., sun-dried] brick." As Middle Egyptian evolved into Late Egyptian, Demotic, and finally Coptic (c. 600 BC), dj-b-t became tobe "[mud] brick."
This was borrowed into Arabic as al-tub (الطّوب al "the" + tub "brick") "[mud] brick," which was assimilated into Old Spanish as adobe [aˈdobe], still with the meaning "mud brick." English borrowed the word from Spanish in the early 18th century.
What Do We Do With The Veggies?
The Traditional Approach
The vegetable garden has traditionally been located in an area separate from other parts of the landscape because it was considered unsightly. With proper planning, however, the garden can be both functional and attractive. We garden in the front yard, behind a five foot high brick wall! Using plants like artichokes can make the yard quite attractive as well as functional.
This gardening philosophy, coupled with our favorable climate, can offer gardening opportunities nearly all year long.
Our Approach
About 25 years ago, we got into raising vegetables. We live in a residential housing area so we decided to use the front and back yards, what used to be flower beds, and every other inch we could scare up!
Has it been fun or what! Flowers are pretty but too much work, only look good for a while, and then you dig them up! We select what we want to grow by not only taste but looks! I guess tomatoes are the most fun! We even started canning thanks to Mitch. . . our son! Container gardening and herb gardening are also fun!