Front Garden

The front garden is small and it is the newest garden.
Because of this, it is also the garden that is the most overgrown.

Weeds overtake some of the plants and I never see them again. Others struggle through until I manage to get over there and weed.

The bit that is closest to the front deck is getting more and more under control this year. I see it more, walk by it more, bend down and pull weeds up more.

It is actually getting quite pretty.

 

 

 

First Food

The first food is ready to come out of my 2012 garden! Rhubarb 'Strawberry Red' is up and almost completely red. I planted two in 2010 but today I can only find one. One is enough for us though and the second was really bought as back up. I plan to make rhubarb vinegar, rhubarb freezer jam and if I am really lucky, rhubarb crisp. Of course, that is all assuming I can get the stalks from the garden to the pot without eating them all. Hmmmm, maybe I need to look harder for the second plant after all...

My Grandmother

We have been picking raspberries for over a week now and the rhubarb is ready to harvest as well. As soon as the heat wave breaks, I will bring it in and turn the stove on. Whenever I bring food in from the garden, I think of my grandmother. Her name was Myrtle but everyone called her Myrt and Miles had a 'Myrt's Cafe' sweatshirt when we were younger that she found a delight. It was appropriate because my grandmother ran a canteen for years at a local bakery. When I think of her, I think of warm blankets, soft pillows, sheets that smell fresh from the line and food. Mostly food. When I was young, I would visit her in the summer and spend everyday with her at the canteen. When we were not there, we were in her kitchen making homemade soup, pies, tarts, buns and anything else she was serving that week. Saturday's were always pies and tarts. All the kitchen counters and the table would get cleared, cleaned and promptly filled with flour. Flour everwhere. Her hands, her hair, her apron, the floor and my face. It seemed that flour was always flying as she rolled, flipped and rolled the dough again. By early afternoon the house would fill with the smell of apple, cinnamon, cherry and lemon eventhough the pies were always a little shorter on filling when I was visiting. One the of the best parts of Saturday was taste testing and then, of course, licking the spoons! My grandmother gave me the gift of appreciation for food fresh from the garden.