Grow, grow, grow your boat🌱
Growing things is something I really had to work hard to acheive. As a young kid things i studied came naturally to me, with little effort. MY first real effor t to grow something was a moonflower vine up the post of my mailbox. It failed miserably. I barely got a sprout and what was there withered fairly pathetically. After a silent flounce, I eventually came back for the sake of cooking what I grew.
These days I mostly grow herbs and food. Cold resitant foods that produce more than one item are my preferred plants. It's hard to get a plant growing around here, sometimes with the inconsistent weather, as global warming snowballs, so things that last as long as possible and make a lot are the MVPs of mid continent gardens.
Currently Growing:
Arugula
Kale took off like a weed last year, but my gut did not agree with my choice of leafy green and everyday was fart city. This year i've settled on something with less chance of gas. The yo-yo weather made my arugula bolt about a month after sprouting. Lucily, it grows fairly quickly so I am already making progress with the second planting. The flowers of the bolted half of the arugula row are pretty to look at and if you eat the stem close to the flowers, it's kind of tasty and not too woody.
Arugula is a leafy green that thrives with my level of watering. It has a peppery taste, good for brightening up boring salads or bland sandwiches. It was supposedly considered an aphrodisac and thusly forbidden from being grown in monastaries.
Acorn Squash
Acorn Squash is one of those things that I don't regularly eat. It will be an adventure to figure out how to put it into my diet beyond a simple chop and roast. The growing process is admittedly hampered by the tomato plant and Zhuchinni falling all over the vines and blocking all the sunlight. I've since yanked and manhandled some of the other plants int he garden. Hopefully this gives it enough space to recover.
Carrots
Thank the stars for carrots. I've eaten this root vegetable most of my life, eather as carrot jjuice or puree or just roasted. It will be nice to finally have my efforts succeed for growing these, myself. The greens stick up beautifully and give me a sense of delight when I see themint he garden bed. Here are two itty bitty specimans I pulled to make space. They are so tiny!!!
Zuchinni!
I thought I was getting cucumbers and mistankley grabbed these without thinking too much about it at the time. Now I have to figure out how to make good use of the produce. It's looking like a simple pan fry is in my future because these guys are coming in relatively quickly, given the unstable weather.
Sage
Supposedly Sage makes you smarter and helps your hair grow. I don't know about all of that. I do know it tastes good in most savory foods and makes my soups taste better. It's also nice to be able to just grab a chunk off the plant and pop it in my mouth on the way out the door.
Thyme!
My basil isn't doing so great. In the gap the struggling basil left this year, thyme has stepped up. It's been carrying my dishes this year. It's easy to dry and looks nice hanging while it does so.
Marigolds!
Not much attacked by either the squirrels or the rabbits, these are the most successful potted flower i've grown so far this year. It has much outlasted the pansies and petunias. Even if they are not food, they are easy to take care of and get a pass in my book. Maybe next year I will plant some in the yard proper.
Mint!
With the torrential rains drowning half my plants, it seemed obvious to grab soemthing that loves being wet. The mint is in a pot to avoid the voracious rabbits and keep it from overtaking all the useable growing areas.
Chives! Rosemary Pansies. Year 2 of Okra. Brevity is the soul of wit and all but restraint is not the soul of a plentiful snack. I planted a whole packet of sugar snap peas and a half packet of ornamental peas in the same row. As you can see the results are visual chaos. It grew up, over the trellis and flopped back down in a bush of greenery. It has kept me in crunchy, refreshing snacks for months now. The decorative breed has beautiful flowers and tiny, flavorless peas. I plan on saving some of the pods to plant next year in a seperate location, to really let the flowers shine. 2024's Growings
Chives have beautiful purple flowers and are a tasty part of the Alum family. They do really well in the local soil, if you keep them properly weeded. They can't keep you fed all by themselves, but they're a good addition to meals and worth having in the garden.
Chives are toxic to cats and dogs, like other Allum family members. They like full sun with light shade. and slightly acidic soil.
Rosemary is a strong smelling plant that adds a lot of flavor. It's also drought resistant, which is good for forgetful gardeners. I plnated osme in a pot and some in the ground.
Year two of potted pansies. Nice, dark purple and white flowers add some late spring color to the patio before thing really get growing. Sadly once summer is in full swing, they shrivel up and die when they are not being attacke dby the local squirrels.
It's growing strong and healthy with no other worry than the insistent beetles that are turning the leaves into lace doilies. It's doing better than most of the other plants in the garden to be quite honest. Sadly I don't like Okra, so this is really just a For Fun thing. I am giving it away but no one seems to breally be a taker. I cna't say I blame them. At least the flowers are pretty when they bloom and the sight of a tall, bright plant is rewarding.
The lighter green ones in the picture are the sugar peas. The darker green leaves are the decorative breed.
Marigolds! Eggplants! Arugula! It's my first year growing Arugula from seed. Last year I got a free plant and dropped it in around my lettuce (which became very bitter in the summer heat) so it didn't have much room to grow. This year it's next to the radishes, which i will promptly replace with more arugula or with more radishes. Arugula is a very good leafy vegetable and honestly should get more attention. Seems to tolerate a higher water level, but also seems to respond well to drier days, so IDK what i'm doing,really! Cucumbers! Radishes! Petunias: I have some petunias in purple hanging out in a pot. Nothing special. They're struggling against the vagaries of the squirrels that pass through and tear up the dirt looking for nuts. They've outlasted the pansies which have fallen to said squirrels, so I am mildly optimistic about their longevity.
Tomatoes Shiso! Okra! Cabbage! 2023's Growings
Marigolds are one of my few purely decorative plants. I hear they deter rabbits, and even if that is not true, they are still a nice pop of yellow that doesn't turn into dandelion fluff and blow away. They're fairly cheap, as well. You can get them in four-packs or grow your own from seeds.
Last year was my first time growing eggplants. I can safely say I had more eggplant than I knew what to do with. If tomato and Zucchini people compete for Number One Most Likely To Foist Produce Off On You, then I felt like a comfortable third place. I learned how to cook eggplant fairly quickly. Honestly a good producer, if you've got the space and time to weed around it leading up to autumn. The purple flowers are lovely as well, when you have them.
Cucumbers are growing. OR at least the plant is. I'm going some from a start for myself and some for seed as part of a community garden aimed at helping feed the hungry in the community.I look forward to seeing the vines uncurl and flower. Also cucumbers are good in bibimbap or on tiny little tea sandwiches. Edit jun26 2023: The vines are growi~ng! They are growing a hell of a lot. They are threatening to choke out my thyme and strangle my tomatoes. Post Op on the cucumbers: I will be very careful about how much I allow my cucumbers to grow. I ended up with way too many cucumbers. I tried jarring some as pickles, which are tasty, but honestly not wortht he trouble of dealing with so many cucumbers. 
Listen i don't like radishes that much, but i've been on a MoDaoZuShi kick and wanted to try my hand at radish farming. I think i weeded out half my radishes by accidentally mistaking the sprout for grass. Oh well! What survived grew doggedly. I ended up with a handful of radishes that were chopped and and added to soup.
need barely be mentioned, they're so ubiquitous as veggie garden stapes in the States. IIRC I bought a Big Boy variety and didn;t start from seed this year.
It grew beautifully until rabbits and squirrels discovered it sitting on my porch and either crashed full body into it, or decided it was tasty and demolished it. Now I have a sad, baren stick of a plant and some dried leaves. I didn't really have a plan for the leaves, but i'm bummed anyway
Okra was grown just to see if I could do it. I planted it very late in the season and only got one ot two peices of okra out of the plant before it was time to pull it.
I grew multiple cabbages. Bad luck with rabbits in the past led me to go for multiple plantings to ward off having it alle aten. This time not a one was eaten until I pulled it. These things got pretty big and took up a lot of space in my garden. Trying to ward off forty days and forty nights of gas from eating all that cabbage, I donated the large ones to the food shelf.I'm sure they appreciated the food as much as I appreciated a guilt free way to off-load the stuff!