The last time I attempted anything close to a garden It cost me $60 to harvest one tomato. Plant, planter, cage, topsoil, fertilizer, plant food...It all adds at the register. I remember thinking I would have been better off spending that money in the produce section of my grocery store.
Eventually, I got tired of my two trips a day lugging gallons of water out to the patio. Yes I know there is such a thing as a garden hose, but it involved an even longer walk around the house and unwinding the darn thing.
After that first fruit I gave up entirely.
The following year the home stores started selling potted tomato plants complete with cage. A much better bargain for $14.99. I pick one up every year, but that, and tossing wildflower seeds into my garden beds is the extent of my gardening.
So why on earth am I planting a vegetable garden this year? Our back yard is on a slop, and except for the southwest corner there's really no place to put a garden. For years I've been eyeing the spot, but my husband had dibs for a shed he never got around to building.
This year instead of ruminating about a garden, and having him veto my idea with his shed. I asked if he was going to get around to building that shed this summer. It must have sounded like a demand to get it done because he was quick to say it wasn't going to happen.
"Well, then I think I'm going to put in a garden."
"Okay."
Who knew it was that easy?
Easy, but not cheap. The trip to the Home Depot cost me $77.12 for the cherry wood border, topsoil and fertilizer. I spent another $55.47 at Walmart for plants and seeds and assorted accessories, like gardening gloves and a hose.
There's no way I'm going up and down that hill to water twice a day. Our youngest broke his collarbone on a Slip & Slid down that hill. Leave it to the oldest to find a way to make a dangerous water slide even more dangerous and then make his brother go first.
Anyway, I can just see myself taking a tumble...
So I invested in a soaker that I can leave in the garden and all I have to do is turn it on and off by the back door. Then my husband got into the act, he's talking about building steps to make it easier for me to get up and down and he bought me a duel hose head and a misting wand so I can water the garden and the patio planters without having to attach and detach hoses or haul water.
I don't know what all that cost him, but it cost me nothing so I didn't add it to my total of $168.12
Counting $13.88 at the Dollar Tree for decorations. And a trip back to Walmart to the tune of $21.65 for mulch.
Am I crazy or what? I'm never going to be a canner like my mother-in-law. I don't have her time and patience or her green thumb. Or a farmer-size garden.
I'll be surprised if I even recoup my money in produce.
I'm already having gardener's remorse and I haven't put in a single plant yet. But when I'm sitting at the top of my hill, looking down on my little patch of earth none of that matters. I have a garden.
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| 72 various seedlings, 12 cabbage, 6 cucumber, 3 tomato, 1 sweet pepper & and marigolds to keep the bugs out. Oh, and not enough room for them all! |
I'm giving away a $10 Gift Card to amazon.com so you can sit back and relax with a book while admiring your own patch or earth. Check back Saturday for a post announcing the winner.
36 comments:
Good luck with your garden. I do not have a green thumb. I couldn't even grow zuchinni. Everything else the deer eat.I do like that they eat the apricots off the ground. Although, we didn't get any last year. One year we got a bumper crop and I even made jam.
The only other thing I even attempt to grow are herbs. I have learned to resist the urge until the basil arrives at the Safeway produce department. Walmart has it out sooner, but it always snows if I try too soon. And the Safeway basil makes great pesto.
Go Ro! Our last house had a great veggie garden, one that was bountiful without much work. This house I have a tiny strip for tomatoes, herb and beans and everything catches cold or bugs and it's hopeless. And yet it gets way more attention, go figure.
I do get very enthusiastic come Spring, but then reality sets in. All that weeding & it gets hot & then the bugs gets most of what does grow.
We have half of our garden planted. Can't wait for fresh tomatoes.
It looks awesome, Rogenna! I'm so proud of you and you'll be eating fresh tomatoes and other veggies while I'm paying high prices at the grocery.
I HAD planned on putting in a veggie garden this year. I even called my yard man and made him mark off the sprinklers so I could place the beds perfectly, but the husband and I got so busy with baseball and book deadlines that those plans fell to the wayside :(
I did plant some new flowers and my planters are starting to look full and bloomy. Good luck with the garden!
Hi Rogenna--Your post made me smile--especially the hose part. I so understand!
I'd love to grow stuff, but the desert is not cooperating. No snow this year, so little water. Everything, including the trees has to be watered by pumping from the creek and I think the creek will dry up around June. I just hope I can keep the trees alive until the rain in the fall. Last year, however, we had a tropical year and we did grow tomatoes. The trick, I've found, is to make the husband head gardener. Then I don't have to deal with the hose.
Yes, I have. My husband and I have planted violas and marigolds in the flower bed and we have planted corn, okra, onions, cabbage, cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers in our vegetable garden.
Rogenna, I think gardening is a lot like sewing clothes and knitting sweaters these days. It used to be cheaper to do both than to go to the store and buy off the rack. That's no longer true. Now we do these things either because we want something original or we enjoy doing it.
I'm starting to get that "I should really plant something" bug, but it's harder to get as excited when I have only a small balcony.
Your garden, on the other hand, looks fabulous--like it's in the perfect spot! I hope everything grows well for you. Tomatoes fresh out of the garden are to die for! Good luck.
Your garden looks beautiful, Ro! Very inspiring. I'd like to have one someday, too.
Good Morning, everyone! I'm at the dreaded day job
, but I'll be checking back at lunch to read comments :)
Great article......I do not have a green thumb at all! Therefore, I would love the Amazon card to read, read! lol
jackie.smith[at]dishmail[dot]net
Wish I knew how to make jam, Kristina :) Wish I had a fruit tree...hmmm.
LOL--Karina. I'm testing the theroy that marigolds keep the bugs away. I once killed a tomato plant by spraying it with dishwashing soap because I heard that kept bugs off the leaves.
Marybelle;
I'm afraid that's going to be me in a few months. That's why I'm keeping the receipts as a reminder :)
Runner :) I'm going to be busy planting this weekend. But what looks good on paper may not actually work.
Hope you have a bumper crop!
Or, Liz, I could be staring at my plot of dirt while you're eatting your fresh veggies from the grocery store.
Kids and Baseball may have something to do with why this is my first real attempt.
Good idea making the husband head gardener, Jeannie. But can we count on them being as relibile as a sprinkling system .
Crystal; Sounds like we'll be eating well at your house :)
I bought corn seeds (don't know if I have room to plant them :) But it reminds me of something my mother used to say...
Knee hi by the 4th of July.
Mary, I agree there was a time when do it yourself was cheaper.
I think size also has something to do with that.
My mother-in-law's straberry patch is bigger than my gardern and it comes back year after year.
Her veggie garden is big enough to need plowing :)
But I think a nice little container garden would be perfect for your balcony.
Cathryn, I may wind up wish ingI'd put off my garden like my husband keeps putting off his shed :)
LOL-Jackie. I assure you my thumb is anything, but green .
I'm looking forward to putting in a garden this year. It's supposed to freeze in the next couple days, so I'm glad it's not in yet.
My mother and grandparents loved to garden, but that gene seems to have missed me. When springtime arrives my thoughts go more to reading a great book outside than to getting my prissy hands dirty.
Every year we buy around 25 tomato plants ~ the bigger the better as we have such a short growing season. Yes we have to water daily but the taste of vine ripened tomatoes is wonderful. We supply tomatoes to our neighbors and love being told how delicious they are. The tomato plants go into the ground after the 5th of June and get covered if there is going to be a cold night. At the end of summer they get covered to try and extend the growing season. We have never tried to figure out the cost per pound of the tomatoes as it would take the fun out of it.
Last year we even spent $14.99 to buy some ladybugs when the plants got aphids. The ladybugs migrated out of our yard and the kids on either side of us and across the street had a lot of fun with them.
Gardening feeds our souls as well as our bodies. It really helps that my husband who did not eat tomatoes when we first got married, now loves them and gardening as much as I do.
LOL, the gardening is all up to my husband. He's the horticulturalist that loves to plant and garden :) I do the occasional watering when he's not available, and I do eat the produce!
I'm laughing at your post, because I've done exactly the same thing -- spent a fortune at the gardening place and then come home and watched everything systematically fail. The good news for me though was that anything that DIDN'T die was hardy enough to survive my pathetic gardening attempts. So after several such expensive trips, I now have a patch of garden that used to be a patch of dirt, covered in a motley selection of whatever plants were courageous enough to hang around!
Ro, honey, I feel your pain the eager expectation for plants to bear fruit that goes with it. I don't do tomatoes. I stopped and I buy them at the farmer's market. Usually. Alas, three of the little suckers followed me from Home Depot and are now sitting snugly in walls of water in my garden along side the radishes, lettuce, spinach and onions. Don't be impressed. You have see the sorry site in July to get the true picture of my gardening strength of will.
Chey, I've heard different planting dates for my neck of the woods; May 10th, After Mother's Day and June 1st.
I'm going to start with the few plants that were already outside at Walmart. I'll let the rest get used to the idea of outdoor living first :)
Summer, nothing wrong with a manicure and a good book :)
Kaelee; I think you're on to something with a garden feeding the soul. I'm going to have to check out the lady bug store.
Well, Snookie that's really the best way to do it, isn't it :)
That's how I discovered my ability to grow wild flowers, Emmie :) they didn't die and they perennial :)
Mary, I like the way you think. Farmers Markets are a great place to get your veggies. I
'm glad those plants followed you from Home Depot. We'll have to swap garden photos in July (just in time for conference) to see how badly we're doing by then :)
Dh has made a small raised garden on the drive for Grandbaby. Last year all it yielded was a good crop of peas and teeny, tiny carrots which lasted through the winter. Grandbaby loved picking teeny, tiny carrots. So the peas and sweetpeas are planted. The carrots this week.
Actually $60 isn't sooo bad. I can't look at how much my husband spends at various nurseries and hardware stores without shuddering. Right now we have lots of pampered pots enjoying the warm spring weather.
Good luck with your garden - gasp on the $60.00 tomato. I like Farmer's Markets too. No garden for me.
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