Garden Challenge Link Up #3

It's time for Garden Challenge Update #3!   I'm linking up with The Homeschool Village, and am so grateful for the chance to "grow" myself in a different area. Things are still growing here, and now we await a small harvest.   

We planted seeds in pots as an experiment to see how they would do.  This is a pot of Nasturtium (on the left).  Did you know that they are a spicy-sweet herb?   We had no idea of its many uses!   I think ours was over-fertilized, because they are getting huge and haven't flowered yet.

On the right is a pot of Marigolds, which haven't flowered yet, either, but they love the mostly sunny spot by our garage.    

In our large raised bed in the back yard, the zucchini is really going to town!

 The cilantro is just starting to poke out... I'm a  little disappointed that more hasn't come up, though.

 Here we have some peppers:

And, another look at the zucchini - just ready to flower.  I love zucchini bread and can't wait until we can make some with ingredients from our garden!

We wanted a way to keep the deer out of our garden, and I think I FOUND IT!    I have been spraying Liquid Fence (per the instructions on the bottle) and it seems to be WORKING.  Now, it STINKS -- no one wants to be out there when I spray -- but who cares if it keeps the deer away?   

I'm grateful for the Homeschool Village - without the challenge I'm not sure I would have planted a garden this year... I've come a long way from my gardening confession in post #1!  

How does YOUR garden grow?

Meeting the Challenge! Linking Up With The Homeschool Village

Where have the past four weeks gone?   When I linked up for the first installment of the Homeschool Village's Garden Challenge, I was a little nervous about this gardening thing.  In fact, I made the confession that I have really never grown anything in my life (save a few pots of flowers here and there).

This is the area I was looking at from my back deck... a great space for gardening, but it does get pretty shady and needed some better soil.   When we were thinking of buying our house we loved this view, because in the spring the woods are so beautiful, the garden was in full bloom, and the yard stays green (even in the winter) because it is Fescue, a cool weather grass that loves shade. 

The raised bed area

I am VERY happy to report that we've had success in our first phase of gardening and are looking forward to more success as the spring finishes and summer rolls around.    I decided to start simple.   We have a large raised bed area, but only planted four different things.  Less is more, right?     My children and I spent a couple of mornings outside hoeing the garden (my sweet husband used the tiller in it to get us going) and then planting our seeds.   We planted zucchini squash, peppers, cilantro, and Phlox and Marigolds.    The best thing was that we had fun... my daughter said to me (after a few hours of hard work in the garden), "Even if nothing grows I still had fun with you, mom!".   Thank you, Homeschool Village for spurring me to do this.  

My two gardeners after a hard morning of planting!

One thing I didn't plan on was having and extra "helper" in the garden.   Check out this Eastern King Snake who was lurking by the garden when we were working last week - after some research we found out you WANT these guys in your backyard!   

He was about 4 feet long!  Yikes!

Our zucchini is starting to sprout - still waiting on the peppers, cilantro, and flowers.   As of today we are seeing tiny sprouts of them... but the zucchini is doing the best. 

Zucchini sprouts

I took the easy way out and planted strawberries in containers.  But guess what??  They are growing marvelously - every couple of days we all get a treat and that has been great! 

Pots of strawberries, and a pot of Marigolds for each of the children... although these Marigolds aren't doing so well!

We had some extra seeds and decided to plant Nasturtium and Marigolds in pots... also discovered these pots (which had soil with added fertilizer) are doing MUCH better than the pots of Marigolds on our deck.    We have a squirrel that has been around these strawberries, but we were able to distract him by putting some food at the other end of the deck - the strawberries have been untouched! 

Afterthoughts of flowers in pots by our garage... they may end up doing REALLY well!

Now we will have to worry about critters getting to our garden.   I regularly see deer in our backyard and last year they had a FIELD DAY with everything my husband planted.  I have heard all kinds of remedies for this, from wrapping Irish Spring in pantyhose and tying it at the corners of your garden, to planting Marigolds (deer don't like the taste of them).   In the end, we went for something called "Liquid Fence" which is chemical free, and is supposed to keep the deer away.   I'll let you know if that works or not!  

Gardening with my children has been a blessing.  I hope you get a chance to read other's experiences at The Homeschool Village link up today ~ I bet you'll see some fabulous gardeners!  

My Deep Dark Gardening Secret

It's good to step out of your comfort zone, right? This is what I'm telling myself as I embark on the Garden Challenge, hosted by The Homeschool Village for the next two months. I have NEVER gardened - I garden vicariously through my husband, who has always been the one to keep our raised beds going. I'm very good with houseplants and potted plants on our deck, but beyond that I'm quite inept - or maybe it's that I've never tried. I'm also not one of those supermoms who homeschools, cooks, cleans, gardens - just not my forte. I'm confessing here in front of the whole blogosphere - MY NAME IS MARY AND I HAVE NEVER GARDENED!

I grew up in south Florida, just a few blocks from the beach, so we didn't really "garden". (I can identify lots of marine life and seashells, though.) My husband, however, comes from a family of gardeners, and we've always had raised beds in the two homes where we've lived. Currently we are on two acres and have a huge backyard and a large raised bed.

This spring, the garden is tilled and looking quite lonely. My sweet husband works long hours and on the weekends devotes much of his time to my son's baseball team and church commitments. The rest of yard has lots of nice landscaping that requires pruning, mowing, etc... It's a big job. He has declared he will not be planting a garden this year. What?!?! Who's going to do it? If it's going to be done it looks like it's up to the children and I, and frankly I'm very nervous.

Here's what I'm starting with; a large raised bed just next to the swing set. We have grown zucchini (I have a great zucchini bread recipe from years of them from our garden) , yellow squash, peppers, tomatoes, and lots of mint (which never dies - comes back every year) with much success in the past. We even did wildflowers and sunflowers one year, which was fun. Last year the deer got at the garden, so I know we need some way to keep the critters out. I'm so clueless.

I thought it might be easier to container garden up on our deck - I already have this out there because Southern Living Magazine had a great article about making your own strawberry containers. See? I did that.

I've also been thinking maybe we should just do a mini garden unit and container garden and also grow beans and corn with our Tops Science kit from Sonlight. Maybe this is a good place for a novice such as myself to start. I pulled out the kit and we've also read our favorite gardening books, Inch by Inch: The Garden Song (I can sing you a song about gardening, doesn't that count for something?) and The Trellis and the Seed (this is such a lovely book about faith and a seed by Jan Karon - perfect for all ages).

If you any advice for me I'd really appreciate it. I'm going to explore some links -- and this post from Susan at Prairie Lily Arts called "Just Dig In" really looks helpful, too. I'm telling myself that whatever my children and I do together will be meaningful, and certainly more than they would be getting in the public school.

For now, I'll leave you with this awesome John Denver/The Muppets video of "Inch by Inch: The Garden Song" - it's a lovely book, so look for it at your library or on Amazon - it would be a great addition to your library. Share this video with your little ones - it's so precious.