Home Grown

This summer, we have been experimenting with growing just a little smidgen of food. I will hold my hands up here & admit that I have no gardening knowledge beyond my 'throw in dirt, add water' technique, but am willing to give it a go. Our garden is mostly paved, with some gravel-filled beds. We have some vague plans to do big work to the garden, but for now I gathered a few odd containers (buckets used for bird feed from my Dad's shed, a red basket left behind in a previous rental house, and some chopped up milk cartons). With help from the Small Human (and the Smallest tied to my back in a sling) we added some gravel, compost & carrot and pea seeds.

 And the plants grew - who knew?

The peas have all been happily chewed; the Smallest Human seemed to appreciate that we grew a mange tout variety (she hasn't quite got the pincer grip for one pea at a time). The carrots are still growing; picking and eating a few a week.

We were also given some strawberry plants this year (thanks B!). The plants produced a little fruit, and a lot of runners, so I'm hoping to have more plants and more strawberries in the coming years.

Our garden output has been so small that it has had no impact on our food purchases. But I hope that this little smidgen of home grown produce will help the little ones understand that food does not magically appear on supermarket shelves. I think we have all enjoyed watching the seeds sprout, flowers appear, bees pollinate, and picking the carrots from the ground to reveal the strangely misshapen vegetables.  Plus home grown produce tastes so much better.