6/10/09

Welcome to my garden



Welcome to my garden! I've been gardening seriously since 1984. Of course, back in '84 I didn't know what I was doing. My first garden was a 'Victory Garden'. My husband and I had just moved to the country and I wanted to plant vegetables and live off the land. I was going to bake my own bread and learn to can and pickle and make jams and jellies.

I knew nothing about gardening, but heck, what was there to know...plant some seeds & watch them grow! Following the package directions, I planted my zucchini in hills, 4 seeds to a hill, 9 hills per row, and 9 rows fit onto my hillside. Water them in and watch them grow. And grow. And grow. And grow. Somebody please make them stop! I was the reason friends started locking their doors at night. So I wouldn't leave grocery bags full of zucchini inside their front doors. Or inside their cars. I had to resort to drive by zucchini tosses at midnight.

I began researching zucchini recipes as I fancied myself an epicurean at the time & did not want to waste one zuke. We had stuffed zucchini, zucchini filled swedish meatballs, chocolate cake with zucchini, zucchini bread, spaghetti sauce made with zucchini, and zucchini pickles. There was more, much more, but suffice it to say, we had our fill of zucchini. Every night. For a year.

My husband found a large deformed zucchini hidden under the giant leaves and turned it into a 'greeter' at our entry with lips holding a cigarette and a twig arm poked into it's side waving 'hi'. We began finding more enormous zucchini that we'd missed while harvesting. What does one do with a 10 pounder? Grate it up & freeze it for later! My husband was the original inventor of 'zucchini on a stick', which quickly became the rage at all our friends' barbeques during that long, oh so long summer.

I've never planted another zucchini. Can you blame me? In fact, I decided veggie gardening was not for me. I'm an artist so why should my garden be functional at all? My garden doesn't match my sofa and it doesn't look like anyone else's. In my neighborhood, anyway.

Thanks for stopping by, I'll tell you more next time.

4 comments:

  1. You have me cracking up with this story. My parents always had a vegetable and more zucchini, tomatoes and acorn squash than we knew what to do with. Love the part about the 'drive bys'. LOL.

    I garden too, flowers these days. I'm definitely no expert and rely on High Country Garden to supply me with zone hardy plants at our elevation. High Country Garden is just another reason to love Santa Fe too!

    I definitely like your new blog and will be following your adventures here! :)

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  2. LOL, thanks Kathleen! I LOVE High Country Garden's catalog & have a list of plants I want from them. For anyone else that happens to want their link: http://www.highcountrygardens.com/

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