Two Feet in the Dirt

With a good day of rain this week, the soil finally got a decent soaking after several weeks of intensely dry weather. Almost immediately, everything looked greener and bigger. The tomatoes are shooting up, requiring a new trellis line every week, and I got a small first harvest off of the bush beans this morning. To date, we’ve harvested over 42 lbs of food out of the garden since May 26!

About a month into harvesting, we’ve now had a good amount of time to see how things are growing and how much we are able to use. As a result, this week was a great time to reevaluate our year’s plan for the garden. Realizing that the spring mix, arugula, and kale are all growing back after each cutting much better than expected, it made sense to decrease the total space allotted to these crops over the year as we’ve been able to get more than expected off of each planting. With the space freed up by this reduction, we had to get our thinking caps on to figure out what would make the most sense for us to grow. 

The primary goal of the garden is to reduce our grocery purchasing budget as much as possible over the course of the entire year. Therefore, it is just as important for us to grow crops that can be stored for use into the winter months as it is to grow those that are ideal for immediate eating. Growing on even a comparatively small 900-square-foot space produces more food each week than our household can consume, so preserving the harvest for later use is essential to getting the most out of the garden. Consequently, we decided to add in plantings of storage carrots and shelling peas. Both will be harvested in the fall and stored, preserved, and/or frozen to be used over the winter. 

And this brings me to the next piece of news- I’ll be introducing a new section to the blog! Whereas the Tips & Tools section focuses on in-the-garden advice, the new section will concentrate on recipes and techniques for using and saving everything we grow. Summer is the time to begin to prepare for the cold days of winter and I will give you an inside look into our methods for canning, fermenting, and freezing to make the harvest last as long as we can!