#12 - Gardening

As I was growing up, we had a very large vegetable garden.  I can remember spending lots of summers weeding and harvesting.  Some of the vegetables were lettuce, carrots, chard, onions, corn, potatoes, squash, cucumbers, radishes, tomatoes, broccoli and cauliflower.

We also had flower beds – carnations, dahlias, pansies, sweet peas, and marigolds to name a few.  Some of these were also planted in the vegetable garden.

Our farm had a couple of old orchards – one had several apple trees and another had pear trees.  We also had cherry trees and Italian prunes.  Oh, there was some hazelnut trees on the property as well.  And lots of blackberries and huckleberries.

My grandfather (we called him Papa) also had a large vegetable garden that contained rhubarb, raspberries, and strawberries.  We also had these on our farm. 

We also had indoor plants like Christmas cactus and an Elephant Ear plant (I don’t know if that was it’s real name but that is what we called it).

When I left home, I had several indoor plants – philodendron, praying mantis, Zygo Cactus (Christmas Cactus), and another cactus plant.  They all died when I moved into a home in Tumwater.  They were put in a room that had lots of light but we forgot about watering them.  Not only my plants but my husband’s as well.

My husband & I had a vegetable garden for a few years – we grew tomatoes, carrots, beans, peas, corn, zucchini, pumpkin, potatoes, lettuce, and some flowers.  With working full time, I just didn't have the time to weed it in the evenings.  We also had strawberry plants and rhubarb.  All we have now are a couple of apple trees and a cherry tree.  I also had a flower bed but that has long since been grown over by grass.  Again, because there wasn't the time to weed it.

One of these days I will plant perennials along the road that I don’t have to worry about (by that, I mean wildflowers).  We do have some volunteer daffodils and wild bluebells.