So happy to report that my garden is growing well for now. We’re starting to get tomatoes and zucchini. Home grown produce is such a treat.

My one wish is that we could grow more things. It’s the trouble with renting that there are only limited areas we can use as a garden. But at least we have some areas. The landlord never did put much into the perimeter of the back yard, despite the brick border creating a growing space, so we’re taking advantage. The few existing non-weed plants we’ve left alone, but there’s still space for a small garden.

We also have a volunteer sunflower coming up, but that’s still well away from blooming. Loads of pumpkin plants from the pumpkin we allowed to break down in the garden, so those will have to be thinned out. A few family members have expressed interest.

I really hope my zucchini plants produce in line with their reputation. I like giving excess away, especially as I have a few friends who I know are on very, very tight budgets. I also want the cheap excuse to play with the dehydrator I inherited from my grandmother.

We should get a nice excess of tomatoes, although those never seem to end up in excess because the kids snack on them quite a bit, particularly the smaller varieties my husband loves to plant.

I don’t know what it is about us and bell peppers, but those never thrive for us. Our sole surviving pepper is slow to grow, although it does have a few blooms, so we’ll see how things go.

I hope the basil goes well this year. I love making pesto when I have enough basil, and the freezing the excess in cubes, to be used over time. I’d say throughout the year, but that overstates how long my frozen pesto lasts until I use it up.

Just for pretties, we have some nice flowers growing too. It’s fun seeing what comes up, since we mostly bought mixes. Some are even local volunteers that simply appeared last year. We spread seeds from those when they go to seed, so each year we hope to see more local flowers. I’m hoping the bees appreciate the flowers.

It’s not much of a garden, not nearly what I’d like to have, but it’s certainly better than no garden at all. I hope some day we can have our own place with more room for gardening, and especially fruit trees.