Let me first say thank you for your sweet comments (and FaceBook messages) on my last post. I am still sitting in limbo. After waking one morning after a terrible night full of fears of hemorrhaging, I called my midwife in a panic. She was able to calm my fears, explained to me most likely what was going on (way better than the OB did), and tell me what to expect when I do start to miscarry. That helped, though I still feel very strange....like I'm sitting here awaiting a nightmare and not knowing when it will come. So that's my little update. I wanted to join in Farmama's post today because working on our little urban homestead has really brought me a lot of peace, healing, and time to just breathe. It is hard to distract myself from the loss and fear I'm feeling right now. Its hard to keep it at bay so it doesn't consume me. And honestly, I am not always successful. But whenever I work in my garden, everything goes away. I don't know why but I don't question it. The garden MUST be watered every night. We do it mostly by hand. And we do it after the kids go down, when it's dusk, so that the plants have all night to soak everything up. So I go out and I water, and pluck weeds, and admire the growth, and make future plans for next years garden.....and in the quiet of my cul de sac, things seem to melt away.
So....in honor of my therapeutic garden....here it is.
These are the two of the three areas we have planted in the front yard. Obviously, we didn't plant enough seeds this year. But its our first year going from a small kitchen garden in the back to a full planted yard with an urban homesteading vision. Next year we will pack more in. The trees have created shade issues so we have been cutting them way back, which is helping. In some cases it was too late but again, we'll know better for next year and we actually plan on taking one of them out completely soon.
LOTS of tomatoes. They grow well around here. The big plant was a store bought one. We have a few of those because I gave up on my seedlings. But that bottom picture is one of my seedlings and it grows inches each week so I may have given up on them too early.
The nasturtium and peas, though ready to harvest, have never made it to the dinner table. The kids graze on them while we play outside. They have tried to entice the neighborhood kids to eat nasturtium flowers but the kids look at them like they are crazy. :) Next year, we need to grow more peas and put them in a different location because they're having a hard time. Not enough sun.
Garlic, onions, corn, squash, and lavender are all doing great.
This is our new baby apple tree that we plan to train as an espalier on the beautiful trellis my husband made me.
And one of our apple trees in the back is exploding. If no more branches break from the sheer weight of their harvest, this may be my first apple sauce year!
Also in the back, our baby grape is now as tall as I am. I swear you could probably watch it grow if you sat a while.
And our sweet girls keep making us loads of super fertilizer. Trying to keep them cool in our extreme heat is a chore, but they continue to supply us with lots of love and comic relief. Bumble Bee is again currently living under our house. I swear I'm going to change her name to Houdini. She'll come out for water soon and join her sister and in the mean time, we continue to try to figure out how she's escaping.
looks great!
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