My daughter loves getting out into the garden with me, especially harvesting the few things we’ve grown. She came to me with this pot she had painted at Daycare and told me she was going to grow some vegies in it. I asked her if she thought it was big enough to grow vegies in and she said “Yes mummy, corn and brocolli and Avocado!”
This is my third attempt at growing pumpkins… I have never had much success before, and although I still would not count this one as a great success either I am proud to actually have a pumpkin shaped pumpkin. We ate the small one (it’s about about palm sized) and about a quarter of the larger one last night, and there should be enough for at least one more meal of pumpkin from the rest… so, a small success – and I’ll just keep on trying again. 🙂
Gardening is another one of my… well not passions, but certainly an interest. I love the idea of growing food for my family, but sadly I lack the motivation to keep up with the weeds and the watering so the results are never as good as they could be. Still I managed to get a few meals out the peas and beans (and most of the peas were devoured fresh by my children before they ever made it inside), and my garlic harvest (so far, I haven’t yet dug up the whole garlic bed yet) has had a 50% success rate. There were enough raspberries and currants for the kids to snack on, and we got 1 strawberry from the plant my son was given at school. There was plenty of silver beet (several meals worth still in the freezer). And we got to eat one or two lettuces before they went to seed. We have a small pumpkin (well technically 3 small pumpkins but the other two are miniscule and as the first frosts are coming soon they won’t get big enough to eat (I’m assuming…)) which should be enough for at least one meal – I’m hoping two. My four tomato plants that I planted, along with the half a dozen others that self seeded, have resulted in 3 tomatoes 😦 And the brocolli… well… I did get one feed of brocolli, but I’m thinking what I planted was something else – broccolini perhaps – because while it looked similar to broccoli it was definately not.
What has surprised me though, are my carrots! I’ve pulled out a few now – I’ve had the odd failure, things that are more the shape and size of a radish, but mostly they have been good, straight carrots, if a bit small. Yesterday I pulled a few more, another stumpy one, and some good ones. But then there was the big one – it looked a decent size from the top – but I just wasn’t sure. I thought I might get another stumpy one, so was preparing myself for the disappointment.
My photo doesn’t really do it justice, but it was a big one! I was so pleased. I added it to the bolognaise yesterday, which I managed to double with a portion of a massive zucchini given me by a friend. So, plan for today is to dig out some more carrots, and use up some of the silver beet and zucchini and make up a vegetarian lasagne. Hoping to make two so that I can freeze one for later. Yum! 🙂
