Our Summer 2020 Garden Tour
THE FARMHOUSE
It’s already mid-August, and I think I can say that our 2020 garden has been a success! For the most part, at least. I’m still a beginner when it comes to gardening and I have SO much to learn. But seeing our garden in the height of summer, in all of its green (and slightly overgrown) glory, really reminds me how cool gardening is. So today I wanted to show you photos of our 2020 garden and share a few things I learned about gardening this year.
Our Farmhouse garden // bbq (black option here), string lights, other sources here
Our garden, which we remodeled last year, has become an integral part of life at our Farmhouse. It’s an outdoor room where we gather, eat meals, play card games, and spend time together. It’s also a place where we bury our hands in the earth and grow food. I’ve only been gardening for real for a couple of years now and am by no means an expert. (Let’s not talk about all that lettuce that’s bolting.) But I am enthusiastic and incredibly lucky to have a mentor to guide me in Garrett’s mom. And it’s worth noting that during a global pandemic gardening feels extra significant, and I’m counting my lucky starts to have this space and the time and energy to grow our own food.
Today I wanted to share a few basic lessons I picked up this year and take you on a little 2020 garden tour for posterity sake. These photos were all taken earlier this week, on a windy day in mid-August. And let me just say that I love seeing the chicken coop roof from the garden!
What we grew this year
First, let’s talk about what we grew this year. Seeds were hard to come by this Spring due to the pandemic, so we ended up picking seeds based on what was available locally.
Annuals: zucchini, butternut squash, pumpkin (volunteer), kale, arugula, lettuce mix, chard, cauliflower, peas, tomatoes, beets, cilantro, curly parsley, carrots, green onions, and basil.
Perennials: cherries, pears, raspberries, grapes, herbs (oregano, thyme, sage, rosemary).
What I learned about gardening this year:
Gardening is a process. I’m pretty sure I’ll still be learning about gardening in a decade. So consider this a reminder to my future self: try to enjoy the process rather than get discouraged by all that you don’t know.
Flowers have a purpose. I started growing cut flowers this year in our garden and in a designated flower field. I’m barely just beginning about flowers, but I love seeing the blooms outside and cut in the house. Flowers bring pollinators to the garden (insects have been on the decline in recent decades so anything we can do to help them is important!) and can also deter mosquitoes and pests and make your garden smell like a summer dream. You may not be able to eat them, but flowers have tons of value.
Peace. The act of gardening is a big positive to my mental health. Dirty hands, clean mind and all that. Especially in the time of a pandemic, when new anxieties pop up on the daily, a hobby like gardening can bring peace, purpose, and a sense of calm to life. There is so much more value to gardening than just the output (but the output is awesome, too!).
Try new things. This year I planted my very first zucchinis, cauliflowers, and brussel sprouts. The first two are well under way and the later was basically just a snack for rodents. Trying new things and seeing what works for our specific garden is exciting and helps me grow as a gardener.
Water. An irrigation system is key to gardening success for me. I mean there’s something really lovely about watering a garden with a hose in the evening after the kids go down to bed and the owls are out hooting. But for guaranteed consistency an irrigation system is necessary. Garrett ran irrigation lines to each of our raised beds last year and then put in a small watering system in the beds last year. We’re using it again this year and our garden got a little dry before we got around to hooking it up.
Compost. It’s called black gold for a reason. My mother-in-law is a big composter and has 100% converted me. I really can’t oversell it. Every time I said something isn’t growing well, Nana replied ‘let’s get some compost on it and water it up good and see if that helps’. It did, every single time. BTW, compost is basically made up of food scraps and yard waste which currently make up for over 25% of what we throw away every year. By composting, not only are you diverting a large amount of waste from landfills, but you’re converting waste into a highly nutritious substance (and ultimately food). It’s basically magic.
Make do. This year I learned the power of making do. I mean you definitely need a few things for gardening like a shovel, a good pair of gloves, a hose, pruning sheers, a wheelbarrow, etc. But you can make do with a lot. Don’t have tomatoe cages? Build your own out of long sticks and twine. Missing a trellis for climbing sweet peas? Try using an old hog panel or metal fence section.
This fall…
I’d like to learn more about growing into the Fall and even the winter. If we have time in the coming months, I’d like to build a cold-frame type cover for one of the raised beds. That would mimic the conditions of an unheated greenhouse and allow us to grow greens late into the year. We’ll see if we get to this one.
Goals for next year
I’d like to ty growing brussel sprouts again and improve our kale harvest (rodents got to it this year).
I’d like to add informal fencing around the raspberries to contain them. We already added the fence posts for this so it’s about adding horizontal twine or something similar.
We’d like to add another raised bed (we already built it!) and possibly a storage/entertaining shed.
We have big goals to build our own compost next year. We currently send our kitchen scraps (what the chickens don’t eat, anyway) to Nana’s compost in town. And our yard waste goes into a large pile at the back of our property. But we have visions of 3 or 4 tall compost stalls large enough for our tractor to access and with plenty of room for all of our food scraps and yard waste.
I’m already looking forward to our next year’s garden!
