MY GARDEN

Today, I would like to share with you my hobby and my passion – gardening. If you’d tell me that I’d be gardening a few years ago, I’d laugh, and say that, there are better things to do with my time, and its so not worth it. You see, when we lived in Ukraine, gardening was a chore, since it was a primary food source for many people. Being a child I remember helping plant vegetables, and to weed garden. Plus, I’ve watched my parents and grandparents work so hard every holiday and weekend in order to put food on a table. Definitely a chore, definitely didn’t want to do it if I didn’t have to.

Five years ago, my family moved to a beautiful countryside with dairy and berry farms all around. It took me a while to appreciate all the beauty and benefits of living in a middle of nowhere, and having a piece of land that is perfect for the vegetable and berry garden.

So, that’s how it all started. First year, I planted some corn, black currants, and strawberries. Obviously, I didn’t know much about what I was doing. I knew I had to put seeds in a soil, water it, and wait to harvest. Yeah right, I was at war with the weeds and slugs all summer long. The results were not worth the effort. I harvested ten corns, one cup of strawberries, and zero blackcurrants that year. The following year, my husband has built a fence, and some raised plant beds. That year I harvested potatoes, strawberries, blackcurrants, sunflowers, onions, dill. It felt so good and rewarding, and I wanted to try more. So, the following year, we decided to go bigger, and grow more. Last year, I had so many zucchinis, tomatoes, cucumbers that I had to start to learn pickling. I pureed the pumpkins and put them in a freezer. All summer long we had fresh salads and herbs from the garden straight to the plate. Children were pulling fresh carrots out of the garden and munching on them as they were the sweetest carrots ever! I enjoyed every step of the process from dealing with the weeds to harvesting, and I wanted to do more.

Going forward, this year I planted sweet peas, corn, blueberries, strawberries, black currants, red currants, beets, carrots, pumpkins, cucumbers, tomatoes, potatoes, zucchinis, onions, sorrel, romaine lettuce, green and red cabbage, winter squash, peppermint, parsley, dill, radishes.

Some beautiful flowers on the borders of the garden to attract the bees.

Still at war with the weeds and slugs. Still learning… I would like to keep my garden organic, so I try not to use any chemicals which makes it a little harder to keep everything in control. I found out that crushed eggs shells are good to fight the slugs. Now I’m saving a bunch of eggshells, and have to wait and see if it works 🙂

If you love gardening yourself, and have an advise or suggestion, please do share. I would love to hear from you.