Monday’s Guests – Grow Us a Garden

Today’s post, which is usually run on Monday is coming to us on Tuesday. It comes from Meriah Nichols who runs the blog Doozedad. She blogs about her urban homesteading with a disability slant as she’s deaf and her daughter has Down syndrome. This is her story in pictures (with some text of course).
By quitting my job last October, we were making the decision to take a huge, gigantic financial hit and really delve into the goodness of a life we wanted – that included actually spending time with our kids. The huge, gigantic financial hit, however, meant that we can’t afford to exclusively buy organic. We have to prioritize the organics, choose the things that will affect the kids (and us) the most. 
And (drum roll, please), grow us a garden! 
This was pretty behemothic for us. While I was raised on a sheep ranch in Cloverdale (before my family migrated to the Fiji Islands), I had a strong and long history of raising suicidal plants. Mikey, having lived in one of those hippie-skippie places for a while before we met was the one with far more practical gardening experience. He knew what the word “mulch” meant. Oh, and “ph“, like “soil ph“. His plants didn’t go and kill themselves.
The thing is, Mikey was the one who was gone all day, working the 9-5. I was the one with the two kids, trying to figure out this “ph” stuff and “mulch” while wrangling two little ones intent on eating worms. My figuring this out, by the way, was what led me to Urban Homesteading, which is what led me to Dog Farm Island – and I am a huge fan.
It was quite a work in the making, this past year. I am (again) on my hands and knees, wrangling the kids in between seed-sowing and weeding for our fall and winter crops. The season is shifting. The fruit, flowers and vegetables are changing. Some life is dying and some is just starting. Let’s celebrate:

 

Celebrate the beans, in all of their bean-tastic glory. Huge, fast n’ easy growing, long-lived and lush, these plants are a cause in themselves to celebrate a great garden run

Coriander! Harvested, seeds. And before we let them go to seed, we enjoyed the cilantro for months. Yes, months. Lots and lots of it. Celebrate!

 

 Celebrate beets, the garden beauty that is gorgeous, both inside and out. Of our tummies. Note to self: MUST PLANT MORE BEETS

Celebrate that we got this! Near-daily bowls of food – often hand delivered by SUPERMAN!

And celebrate that SUPERMAN got to smell the poppies

Celebrate Audrey, she of the Massive – and numerous – Progeny.

Celebrate good, great, fantastic, no – the best neighbors  anyone could ever hope to have – and share a garden with – love you both – xoxo

Celebrate pool swims

And tomatoes

And tomatoes-in-pool -swims!

Celebrate being with Daddy

and okay, Mommy too

my cleavage makes me wince

Celebrate MUD and all the fun that brings

Celebrate the flowers

 Oh, the flowers!

 Let’s celebrate the flowers!

 Garden: you’ve been good to us.

Thank you.
***

And on that note, while there is still time, I need to get back to planting those beet seeds. And kale. And lettuce. And collards. And any and all of the winter-ish vegetables I can, with maybe a few flowers/ornamentals thrown in – because feeding our soul is important, too, isn’t it?
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