Working in the Garden
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We had unseasonably beautiful weather over July 4th weekend this summer and I spent that Saturday morning cleaning up my garden. I decided to bring out the camera and hit the record button, to show some behind-the-scenes footage as I worked. In this video & blog post, I’m sharing some tips, tricks and techniques for working in the garden. My tasks include mowing the grass around the garden boxes, weed-whacking, managing the strawberry plants, harvesting peppermint and weeding around the asparagus. You'll even learn what my favorite mid-morning snack is these days. Check it out!
We've had some debate in our household about whether to keep the area around the garden boxes as is, with grass, or to put down mulch or pebbles. Sure, adding that kind of material might make the garden visually more attractive, but honestly, the grass really seems to be the easiest surface to maintain, since I can just mow and weed-whack around the boxes. And it's a nice surface for walking barefoot, when it's not mosquito season. It’s also the cheapest option, since it doesn’t require purchasing mulch or pebbles. So my first task in this video is mowing the walkway between the two sides of the garden and some other areas between the boxes. Then I use this cordless weed-whacker from Black & Decker to clean up the rest of the areas in the garden that aren't as easily accessible with the mower.
Last year, I planted eight strawberry plants in one box and over the last year, these plants have taken over the box very well. If you want to learn more about planting strawberries, I made a video documenting the process, which can be seen here. This year, the strawberry plants produced some very small berries that were not at all impressive. Hopefully next year the fruit will improve. In the meantime, the plants are shooting runners outside the box and in this video, you'll see me guiding the runners back into the boxes, so that they can take root in their dedicated box and so that I can weed-whack around the box without cutting up the shoots.
Additionally in the video, I share some tips on the type of clothing to wear while gardening. The mosquitoes in our area are terrible and they really dictate how I dress from late spring until early fall when working in the garden. I don’t find bug spray effective at all. Instead, I make sure all my skin is covered, from head to toe. I wear long socks, sneakers, long pants, a long-sleeve cotton shirt and a straw hat. If not for the mosquitoes, I’d spend way more time in the garden. But instead, I have to take the time to cover up before spending more than 2 minutes with my plants. I’m also not a fan of sunscreen, so covering up also provides full sun protection, as well as protection from anything that could fly up while mowing or weed-whacking. Eye protection is also important when performing either of those tasks. Safety first!
After the mowing and weed-whacking, I took a break to make my current favorite mid-morning snack: homemade chocolate milk! I use a recipe from the book How to Heal Your Metabolism, by Kate Deering. Here are links to the book from: Amazon & Books-a-Million. Yum! The chocolate milk is so delicious.
While taking a break from the garden work, I highlight some of the plants that are growing this year: cucumbers, chives, mizuna, thyme, sage, rosemary, green beans, sweet potatoes, calendula, tomatoes, zucchini, yellow squash and asparagus. Next, I harvest a big bunch of peppermint, which is always plentiful in my garden this time of the year. Then for my final task of the day, I work on weeding around the asparagus plants. This is a very tedious task because some of the weeds, like lambs quarter, look a lot like asparagus at the base of the stem. So I have to be very careful not to mistake weeds for asparagus speers. And that’s a wrap! It was a very fun morning in the garden!
Are you growing any food at your home? If so, please tell us all about it in the comments below!
- Christin
