About Growing Vegetables

I am trying this year to grow vegetables year-round for my family. Last year I tried to grow some vegetables - got a lot of tomatoes, some squash, some spinach, some lettuce... that was about all. I had a new four month old baby, was breastfeeding constantly, and tired mostly.

But I read alot about gardening for vegetables, did a lot of research, talked to people and went in this year with big plans and a lot of seeds. Not all of those plans are manifesting in success, but we are growing alot. This section of the blog will be documenting my successes and failures as the year goes by. I plan to grow vegetables that can be harvested throughout our generally mild Portland winter, and we will see how that goes!

Everything that I am growing I started from seed myself, either indoors or in the garden, unless otherwise noted. All methods and supplies are organic unless otherwise noted. We have a standard 50 x 50 lot with a house on it in a semi-urban area of NE Portland. We started with a beautiful yard, and two raised beds in the shade under a plum tree! I couldn't get anything to grow there very big. This year we made two 4x8 raised beds (12 inches deep with organic humus brought in!) in the front of the house (on the boulevard strip). We are also using the sunny part of the herb wheel in the center of the garden as a growing area. There, I just have mounds of compost going. We are also trying to use as many sunny spots as possible, as well as an attempt at container gardening for peppers and eggplant and tomatoes, who generally like a lot of heat. We are still trying to grow things in the shady bed (the one left), but probably will abandon this next year.

Since I am starting this blog in the beginning of the year, the next post will summarize what has happened so far and then I hope to post often to follow the months for the remainder of the year and into next year. It will hopefully be ongoing. I'll try to put up pictures too. We'll see. With a toddler around, it's hard to imagine having the time to do this (see About Motherhood)!

I also use "I" and "we" here: I am the one planning and implementing the actual growing of vegetables, W is also a part of the process, often helping to build raised beds, do other manual labor, discuss what to grow, help with weeding, etc. It is our house and our family, but when I am doing something specific I use "I". D also helps in the yard by moving starts around, putting soil in odd places and sticking her hand in the sprinkler quite a bit.