How Aryn’s Garden Grows
We’ve got an exciting new feature for our readers at Checkout Chicks! On the second Thursday of each month, we will bring you a new edition of what I lovingly refer to as “How Aryn’s Garden Grows”.
One of my cost saving secrets is that I try to grow some of my own fruits and veggies during the summer. Last year, I only grew a few things in containers. This year, I have a full fledged garden as well as a few containers! I’m really excited to see how well it all turns out. I warn you though, I am certainly not an expert gardener, so you may be witness to many gardening mistakes along the way. I encourage all of our readers to speak up any gardening advice that you may have. I will certainly appreciate it! Or, if you have any questions, feel free to ask and we’ll see if we can answer them for you!
First are my containers of basil. Some of them are looking like a squirrel has been noshing on them a bit. They also aren’t growing very fast. I hope they sprout up pretty quicky; I really need my basil!
Next is my container of cilantro. This one is looking very sad. I’ve never grown cilantro before so I may need to do a little research on how to make this little guy look/grow a little more healthy!
Here is one of my containers of tomatoes. All together, I have two strong and healthy tomato plants in containers that I bought from a greenhouse. I also have one little guy that I have grown from seeds. All of my containers of tomato plants are the cherry variety.
Here is one of the things that I’m really excited about - blueberries!! I’m so hoping that this plant bears fruit this year. I’ve heard that blueberry bushes won’t bear fruit the first year so I’m hoping that isn’t true and we’ll have some delicious berries to snack on this summer!
This one is a little funny. . .you may be wondering why there are newspapers surrounding these plants. Well, my garden has been overtaken with weeds. . .seriously, I can’t pull them out fast enough! Unfortunately, there is clover ALL OVER my backyard and it spreads like wildflower. A friend of mine told me that if you laid wet newspaper around your veggies, it would keep the weeds away. I’m at the point of desperation now, so I was willing to try it. However, I quickly found out that wet newspaper dries out, and then blows all over the backyard. So, the newspaper will be going away soon and I will be back to pulling weeds like a mad woman. Anyways, these are my iceberg lettuce plants. We’re not big salad people in my house, but it looks like we’d better quickly learn what to do with a surplus of lettuce if these plants end up doing well!
Now, we’re on to my yellow squash. I am astounded at how quickly this stuff has taken off! It has gotten HUGE! No fruits yet, but I expect they’ll start peeking out pretty soon.
These are my ground tomato plants. These little devils have taken off like CRAZY! Word to the wise, tomato plants grow really, really fast! I haven’t seen any little baby tomatoes yet, but I do see several of the little yellow flowers that seem to bud before the baby ‘maters pop out. All three of these plants are “Big Boy” variety.
These are my cucumber plants. I had tried growing some cukes from seeds and didn’t see them sprouting up as quickly as I thought they should so I went and actually bought some plants that had already started. Little did I know, my cucumber seeds were just about ready to sprout up and now I have lots of cucumbers growing in the garden! Oops, luckily my family and I LOVE cucumbers!
I’ll be honest, I’m not sure what this is. It’s either green beans or peas. I planted a couple of things and forgot to mark what it was (learning lesson #1: mark EVERYTHING! DO NOT rely on your memory.) and now I don’t know it is. It’s just kind of a surprise for me to see what ends up growing on these plants!
The little star shaped leaves (the teeny tiny ones) are actually carrots that I am growing from seed. It should be interesting to see if these grow! I’ve heard that carrots are pretty easy to grow so hopefully, I’ll get a little crop of my own this year!
The long thing in the middle of the picture that looks like green string is either red or white onions. I planted roughly 20 seeds and have about 3 plants that are still growing strong. I just transplanted those into the ground so we’ll see how well they do.
Now, this is something that I inherited from the previous owners of the house. This is a mess of strawberry plants that I’m not sure I’m all that thrilled about. First of all, they are overtaking EVERYTHING, including the yard! My fiance found several little itty bitty (but very red) strawberries growing in the grass last weekend when he was cutting the grass. The main plant is just out of control. Not sure what I should do about it, so if anyone has any ideas, please feel free to share them! I may just rip it out next year and re-plant some strawberries so that I can get a little more control over it. Again, if anyone has any ideas, please share!!
However, it’s not all that bad, because it is growing strawberries already! They don’t look all that appealing, though!
Hope everyone enjoyed this edition of “How Aryn’s Garden Grows”! Next month’s edition should be just as fun!
Most people understand the general concept of mail-in rebates: manufacturers offer a cash-back incentive for purchasing their product if you mail in certain proof of purchase documentation within an allotted time frame. This lowers the end cost of the product and makes it more attractive to consumers. Many people will purchase the product with every intention of redeeming their rebate but never follow through. Manufacturers count on this low take-rate percentage.