Okay, the wife here again with more of my gardening background.

It’s already been said that my parents had green thumbs, but my father also had knowledge. He would talk to other gardeners or nursery owners to glean information from them. So, if Dad was having any issues with plants, in the car he got and went on an information finding trip. Unfortunately nowadays we just go to the internet to get our information. Don’t get me wrong- the internet is an excellent source. But there is no personal relationship with the internet. There is so much more to be gained from personal contacts and I think today’s society is missing those wonderful connections. Okay, this is probably a better topic for my son’s blog; Christianity, politics and controversial issues, http://controversiallibrary.blogspot.com/

so I’ll get back to gardening.

My dad did use fertilizers, lime, calcium, and occasionally planted a winter crop to help get the best from the garden. For fertilizer my parents composted their food and garden scraps to put back on the garden. My parents gardened in the same space for decades and still managed to produce abundance every year. We canned and froze the produce and ate healthy all summer. Occasionally something truly amazing would surprise us such as the carrot in the accompanying picture. This carrot had to be sliced to be eaten and the bigger slices wouldn’t fit in a baggie for my school lunch.

When asked how the garden did so well, my father always said it was because he sang to the plants at night! Can’t recall him ever singing, but he certainly whistled all the time. I think mostly it was his love of gardening that made the garden do so well and he passed that passion onto his wife and children.