'Twas the Night Before Christmas - A Gardener's Version

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all my blogging, gardening, chickening friends out there! I'm still beside myself as to what to do with my weed-filled garden since I can't solarize it 'till summer, so I'm on hiatus until I can think of some way to fix it. Regardless, I still wanted to wish you all a Merry Christmas and re-post the Gardening Christmas poem I wrote last year! Hope you enjoy!!!


'Twas the Night Before Christmas - A Gardener's Version
by Kate at Gardening Without Skills

'Twas the night before Christmas when all through the yard,
Not a veggie was growing, not even the chard.
The trellis was strung by the green beans with care,
In hopes that an edible plant would grow there.

The chickens were nestled all snug in their nests,
While visions of pasta worms danced in their heads.
Farmer B with his light beer and I with my wine,
Had just settled down for some nice TV time.

When out in the garden I heard a big noise,
I leapt from the couch and tripped over some toys.
Away to the screen door in four seconds flat,
Flipped open the gate latch and tripped on the cat.

When what to my bloodshot eyes did appear,
But a master gardener with a new pair of shears.
He was pushing a wheelbarrow so heavy with plants,
That I started to do my best happy dance.

He was dressed all in green from his hat to his boots,
And his pants were all muddy with dirt from plant shoots.
A bundle of seedlings he had flung on his back,
And he looked for a place to begin the attack.

His trowel how it twinkled - his hoe was so shiny!
His spade was brand new - his gloves were so tiny!
His droll little mouth was drawn up in a smile,
As he worked with his tools in a whimsical style.

He spoke not a word as he started to plant,
And took out some seedlings that he could transplant.
He filled all the raised beds with veggies galore,
As I stood there watching from my screened back door.

And laying his shovel right next to his hoe,
I knew it was time for the gardener to go.
But I heard him exclaim as rolled out of sight,
Happy Gardening to all and to all a good night.

Cabbage Expiration Haiku

One of my new-found gardening problems is having no clue when certain not-so-obvious vegetables are ready to harvest. I have potatoes growing right now that might have been ready two weeks ago and then again, might not be ready for another month. Who knows?

I have an eggplant growing that looks ready to harvest. It's much smaller than a typical grocery-store eggplant, but it's about the size of the eggplants I got in the veggie co-op a few weeks ago. Maybe it's ready to harvest? Maybe it's past ready? Again, clueless.

And let's sidestep to talk about my dream the other night. I watched a YouTube video on how to harvest a cabbage because I had a feeling that my lone cabbage plant was ready to be harvested. It had some holes in the outer leaves, but the center head looked great. It had to be time. All of my spring cabbage plants went kaput in the heat, but I had one pretty cabbage plant from last Fall that looked about ready to go. I watched the video and decided that my cabbage was about ready come out of the garden. I went to bed that night and had a weird dream about pulling the cabbage up and it made this horrible ripping sound and I pulled and pulled and ended up ripping up half of the Northern Hemisphere up with it. It was very disturbing.


Fast-forward to yesterday morning. After having that dream I decided that it was finally THE day to harvest that cabbage. I figured I'd let the chickens out and then come back inside, get a knife and head on out to the garden. On the way back inside I swung by the garden to discover, much to my horror, that some evil creature of the night clearly had the exact same dream and eaten the cabbage before I got there.


WHY DOES THIS ALWAYS HAPPEN TO ME?

I'm always a day late and a dollar short in the garden.

To mark my cabbage's demise, I've written a short haiku.


(*note: I spelled basterds with an e, much like Quentin Tarantino's "Inglourious Basterds". No one knows why he did it, but apparently it's less offensive to spell it wrong. And on a gardening blog, I aim to unoffend, even in the face of cabbage murder).

Ode to EG

If you've poked around my blog before you know I have a thing for silly poems. Here's one I wrote for EG as a thank you for his recent gift to me.

Ahem…

Ode to EG

There once was a gardener from 'Bama
Who's as good with a hoe as a hammer
He grows his own food
With a big dog named Jude
And he speaks with the best redneck grammar

If you're into garden blogs as part of your quest to grow an awesome vegetable garden, you should know about EG. If you don't know him, visit his blog at "Our Engineered Garden" and start reading. To save you the time of getting to know him, let me paint a picture for you. Combine MacGyver, Yoda and Jeff Foxworthy and there you have it - EG.


He's like MacGyver in that he can make or fix just about anything….from a fridge to a rain barrel to transforming a bucket into a self-watering container. Somehow he'll make it using old yogurt cups, a kitty litter container, a ball point pen and four paperclips. And if you want to do it too, just ask him - he's quick to post a step-by-step tutorial on his blog to help out his readers. He's like Yoda because he's got some seriously mad skills and is definitely tied in to the force (of nature?) in his gardening exploits. Yoda's "Do or do not, there is no try" quote wraps up EG's gardening mantra perfectly to me.* He can talk you into trying anything new in the garden because he makes it look so easy! And just watch one video on the man's site and you won't need my Jeff Foxworthy explanation….'nuff said.

I'd like to thank EG for the awesome box (covered in messages) he sent me this weekend! (He sent Ribbit one too and you can read about hers here). He included a CD that is the Holy Grail of Gardening - it's got more information on that CD that I ever imagined. I spent hours last night ignoring my family and flipping through the cyber-pages of gardening literature on that CD. When I'm done with it I'll be like the Scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz when he finally got his brain.


He also tucked in a jar of my favorite jam - Blackberry Jam! I'm giddy and can't wait to try it on some homemade bread later this week. Thanks so much EG!!!! I can't begin to express my gratitude!! I hope to have a tenth of your gardening knowledge one day…




* Star Wars analogies and quotes make you a huge geek IF you don't have two small Star Wars obsessed boys…which I do…so it's okay for me to quote Yoda and still be cool. Just sayin'.

'Twas the Night Before Christmas - A Gardener's Version

'Twas the Night Before Christmas - A Gardener's Version
by Kate

'Twas the night before Christmas when all through the yard,
Not a veggie was growing, not even the chard.
The trellis was strung by the green beans with care,
In hopes that an edible plant would grow there.

The chickens were nestled all snug in their nests,
While visions of pasta worms danced in their heads.
Farmer B with his light beer and I with my wine,
Had just settled down for some nice TV time.

When out in the garden I heard a big noise,
I leapt from the couch and tripped over some toys.
Away to the screen door in four seconds flat,
Flipped open the gate latch and tripped on the cat.

When what to my bloodshot eyes did appear,
But a master gardener with a new pair of shears.
He was pushing a wheelbarrow so heavy with plants,
That I started to do my best happy dance.

He was dressed all in green from his hat to his boots,
And his pants were all muddy with dirt from plant shoots.
A bundle of seedlings he had flung on his back,
And he looked for a place to begin the attack.

His trowel how it twinkled - his hoe was so shiny!
His spade was brand new - his gloves were so tiny!
His droll little mouth was drawn up in a smile,
As he worked with his tools in a whimsical style.

He spoke not a word as he started to plant,
And took out some seedlings that he could transplant.
He filled all the raised beds with veggies galore,
As I stood there watching from my screened back door.

And laying his shovel right next to his hoe,
I knew it was time for the gardener to go.
But I heard him exclaim as rolled out of sight,
Happy Gardening to all and to all a good night.

TOMATO WOE - a limerick

TOMATO WOE - a limerick

My first ripe tomato turned red
But it developed a crack on its head
Then a bird ate its skin
Before I could dig in
And now I'm eating some store bought's instead.


Seriously - am I not meant to enjoy a mater from my garden? I haven't had any watering issues (up until this week's torrential downpours) so I don't know how the damn thing cracked. And this morning - THIS morning - was the morning I had put aside to pick the tomato. My first ripe tomato. I had fresh turkey and cheese and a hoagie put aside just for this morning's first tomato. And wouldn’t you know that a bird decided to peck at the damn thing right before I got there. A garden is definitely a lesson in patience...and humility.

Woe is me.

Happy Belated LAPCPADPOUB Day

I can't believe I missed LAPCPADPOUB Day. Going to the petting farm and fantasizing about chickens and the whole family being sick recently... it just overtook me and I dropped the ball. I suppose a belated LAPCPADPOUB Day is better than no LAPCPADPOUB Day at all, right? Here is my contribution to LAPCPADPOUB Day.

Ahem...

Ode to Damian

I have crossed eyes and a crooked tooth
And a kink at the end of my tail
I am known to eat the strangest things
Like ribbon, rubber bands and mail

I'll also eat broccoli, peas and green beans
Or anything covered with glue
I'll eat tulle 'till I'm sick and it's caught in my throat
And my litterbox has decorative poo

Don't you celebrate LAPCPADPOUB Day? You should. Visit the Inelegant Gardener to find out the details of 'Let's all post cat photos and dire poetry on our blogs' Day.

Enjoy!

(And before you think I've gone off my gardening rocker, tomorrow will be the second installment in the Great Garden Experiment with updates on my tomato and bell pepper plants)

The Hit List

PBJ Haiku
Peanut plant becomes
Organic peanut butter
Where's the jelly plant?

I have received a few emails from people who want to know what we plan on growing in our large rectangle of dirt. We have drawn out a garden map at the advice of our gardening book, "Vegetable Gardening in Florida." The map shows what we *hope* we can stick in the ground to turn into vegetables. I have separated the garden into five sections that make perfect sense to me and I'm sure this must be how fancy high-falutin' gardeners divide their gardens too:
1) Tall Stuff
2) Spaghetti Sauce
3) Stuff that isn't supposed to grow because it's out of season, but I feel I know better than the gardening book and I'm going to try it anyway.
4) Girly Stuff
5) Kid Stuff

In the Tall Stuff section we're hoping for cucumbers and pole beans. Having something crawl up a vine on a stick just seems fun and cucumbers and pole beans were the only things that sounded edible from the list in the book.

In the Spaghetti Sauce Section we have tomatoes, leeks, bell peppers and zucchini (all ingredients in my favorite homemade spaghetti sauce recipe).

In the Stuff that isn't supposed to grow because it's out of season, but I feel I know better than the gardening book and I'm going to try it anyway section we have sweet potatoes and mint. Sweet Potatoes are supposed to be planted in June - no later! I don't get why this matters since we don't get cold weather here, so I'm going to prove a point and try and grow some in August - gasp! And I've read that mint should be grown indoors in Florida, so I'm planting some outside to see what the big deal is. Apparently it can get out of control. Ha! I have yet to successfully grow a plant, let alone see one get out of control on my watch.

In the Girly Stuff section we have carrots, lettuce, broccoli and herbs. I should be able to sit out there with a bottle of fat-free 1,000 Island and a fork and just forage if I ever get locked out of the house.

In the Kids Stuff section we have things the kids will be interested in, namely peanuts, pumpkin, watermelon and strawberries.

I am well aware that if we cannot find seeds, or seedlings or slips or whatever else you're supposed to stick in the ground to grow the aforementioned veggies, that the list will be modified.