New Plan

Okay, I know I said we'd have a smaller garden this year. But that was before I:

A) rediscovered a sexy heap of gardening supplies in the corner of the basement;
B) started reading The Long Emergency by James Howard Kunstler; and
C) asked my four year old what he wanted to grow in the garden this year. Turns out he has plenty of ideas.

So here's the new plan. We just put in an order at Salt Spring Seeds for three kinds of tomatoes (Costoluto Genovese, Tibet, and Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter), Winter Party onions, and Royal Chantenay carrots. Charlie's also hell-bent on having broccoli and "salad" in the garden, so I'll buy those seeds locally. We'll have to replace the apple tree in the front yard (@#$% deer; we'll fence it like Gitmo next year). We'll add some berry bushes in the front, expand the squash patch in the back, and probably add some bean climbers at the end of what used to be the driveway, along with the hops.

Is this the final blueprint? Probably not. It's still February. And if last year's experience has any predictive value, we'll end up with an entirely different garden than we plant, anyway. (Spinach self-seeded last year, for instance; who knows what it'll look like in the spring?) The point isn't so much to have a successful garden, though, as to develop the skills necessary for having one in the future. We're just learning as we go along.