I'm No Green Thumb

Its only been in the past five years that I have become interested in growing things--ever since we bought our home. Ray built a 5'x5' box so I could experiment with growing our own vegetables. Here's the sun shining through my zucchini:

We also inherited a great raspberry patch that keeps growing bigger every year.

I know raspberries have been labeled weeds, but they are my favorite weed ever. Each year in late June or early July, these succulent little berries grace a large area along my back fence, and I feel strangely akin to them somehow. They have brought me such joy. Before this I was never really drawn to the raspberry. I would usually order the strawberry or blueberry menu items. But once I tasted the great freezer jam that came from my backyard harvest, I've never been the same.


See below, the arrow is pointing to the little cone that is left once you pick a raspberry. Its easy to know when a raspberry is ripe enough to be picked: it has fallen slightly so you can see the base of the cone just a little bit. But then take care--it will practically fall off as you pick it!

Look below at how a clump of raspberries grows. Only one or two ripen at a time. So I go out and pick them every other day. You're not forced to harvest them all at once. How considerate!

At the beginning:

At the end:

We also have Concord grapes growing along the back fence (another gift left from the previous owners.) Unfortunately they have such hard seeds that they are not so enjoyable. I'd actually like to pull them out, but Ray wants them to stay for now. They are pretty anyway, as shown below, but I don't like how they crowd out my raspberries, and block their sun.

Behold my very small garden. When the prophet said to plant a garden, did he specify how big? Hope not!