Oh holy edibleness!

We finally did it. We grew something edible this season. We can call it quits now and know we ended on a high note. I think I'm most excited about the zucchini because its success means I've accomplished quite a few things on my gardening to-do list, namely starting something from a seed on the patio, transferring the seedling to the garden, and having it turn into a full-fledged plant that lived long enough to bear fruit. I seriously feel like I'm ready for my own TLC show at this point.

So here they are in all their glory.


Nevermind that all three of my zucchini plants seem to have issues. The one in the pot is always very wilted by mid-day and only seems to only revive first thing in the morning. One of the other zucchini plants in the garden has yellow edges to all of its leaves - just like someone got a marker and colored a fine yellow line around the edges. That can't mean anything good. And the other one has a hint of yellow leaf edges and is tipped over and is lying sideways on the soil. Once again, it can't be a good sign, but for all I know zucchini plants do periodically chillax on their sides in gardens. Afterall, my zucchini plants are the only zucchini plants I've ever seen, so what do I know?

Remember those bags of strawberries that my mom got me for Easter? They're actually doing pretty good (pic here).They're on the patio, safe from whatever evil creature of the night is eating my garden strawberries. This location is safe, but it requires me to remember to water them, which I've actually been doing even though I'm genetically predisposed to poor plant watering.

Look at the first little berry harvest.


They're small, but they're sugary-sweet! I don't know what happens when their "season" is over. I'm not sure if I take them out of the bags and put them away, or leave them hanging, or if I just discard them. I assume strawberry season will be over soon and I'll have to figure out what to do with them. Until then it's a nice sweet treat by the pool.

Strawberry Sacks Forever

I came home the other day to find this box sitting on our doorstep.


Open Immediately. Perishable. Live plants. Huh.

I took it to the patio and opened it up only to discover it's an Easter present from my mother who figured I'd enjoy this more than chocolate. She's right, but I think chocolate has a better chance of surviving in our house than a box of live plants. This is saying a lot since I love chocolate and my husband has a gargantuan sweet tooth, which he passed on to one of our children.

Nevertheless I unpacked the box to find a bag of dormant strawberry plants, two hanging bags, a sack of soil-less planting mix and some very basic instructions.


After reading the instructions about 20 times I decided to go to their website for help. It had step-by-step photos to show you how to set up your bags. It actually seemed possible to assemble this contraption.

Jace came out to help and as you can imagine, he was a HUGE help. A three-year-old and an inquisitive dog are really great assistants when you're assembling dormant strawberry plants.


I separated the strawberry plants and realized that it was hard to tell the roots from the plant at first. After picking through a couple I figured it out. Yes, I'm just that skilled.


I know I didn't follow directions perfectly because it involved spreading the roots out, which I had a very hard time with and watering the bag after each plant went in, which seemed entirely too messy. I managed to get all of the plants stuck in the odd little holes in the bag and then I watered the whole thing.


Then I spent the next 20 minutes holding the dripping wet sacks o' berries while walking in circles around the back of the house realizing that we don't have any hooks to hang the things from. Eventually I looked over at the pool and found two hooks that hold up our pool net so I hung them from there. This is by far the most difficult place on our entire property to water anything since it's on the other side of the pool fence, so obviously they'll have to be moved at some point.


I have zero confidence that these things will actually grow into strawberries, but we're going to give it a shot. I had no clue that strawberries went dormant and could spring back to life. I had no clue they could be grown in hanging plastic sacks. And I had no clue that anything could be grown in a soil-less mix. Guess we'll see what happens. Chocolate isn't this complicated.

Sidenote: Check back this weekend for some super-cute Easter pics of the chicks!

We have a thief in our midst

I have two little strawberry plants that are growing in two pots in my garden and are actually doing really well. I have one big beautiful strawberry on one of the plants and two little ones on the other plant that were ready to be picked yesterday morning. I've been watching them turn from white to pink and finally almost all the way to a bright beautiful red.



Yesterday morning I got up excited that it was berry-picking day - I am well-aware that picking three strawberries hardly warrants naming a day "berry-picking day" but we're just that desperate. I skipped out to the garden to get them and was so excited that this was going to be one of the first things we'd actually be able to eat from the garden. I went out there and reached down and…

And…



Son of a . . .

Well I'm sure the two little red berries on the other plant are safe, right? Right?

GAAAHHH!. . . not so much.

Some evil creature of the night sunk his fangs into the berries and gave me the salute of victory as it scampered off with my three red strawberries in its clutches. What sort of evil creature did such a thing? A shifty-eyed squirrel that taunts our dog every morning is my primary suspect. Plus there's that evil mockingbird that chirps away in the tree next to the garden. They're both on my list now.

I'm tempted to tie the German Shepherd to the strawberry plants at night to protect them, but he's a soft dog that requires a feather-stuffed dog bed and air conditioning and with my luck he'd develop a taste for strawberries and fall under the spell of the berry-loving creatures of the night and end up working for the enemy.

What can I do to stop this? Anyone have an idea for me?? There are three more white berries on the plant that will inevitably be the next victims of this sinister creature now that he has tasted their sweet juice. How can I save my berries? Do I have to keep them on the patio from now on?

Update: Went out to the garden this morning. Now all the little white berries are gone. You can see that they've been eaten. I bet those damn squirrels have been waiting patiently for something in the garden to grow and now it's their morning breakfast stop. Sigh...