Container Gardening

My backyard garden, with then exception of a couple of handfuls of cucumbers and strawberry plants that are still alive, bit the dust early on last summer. We had a VERY rainy summer early on that caused bad things to happen to my cucumber plants, and then an almost drought at the end of the summer. My bell peppers produced maybe 4 peppers. It was very disappointing.

I decided to try out container gardening this year on my front porch since we spend so much time out in the front yard. I'll be more likely to take care of things right in front of my nose. Hopefully. 

I ordered heirloom seeds online (because GMOs and non-organic seeds = yuck). They arrived last week :)

This morning, after Jack's speech lesson, the kids and I met up with my dad at the local feed store.  I found two 16 gallon containers to get us started and a couple of bags of organic soil. 

 

Dad grabbed his drill and headed to our house to drill drainage holes in the containers. Jack helped :)

 

 

We crumpled up newspapers to line the bottom, and the kids added a few broken sticks for good measure. 

 

 

Then the fun task of filling them up with soil began. The kids were good helpers, especially Jack. He filled his with very little assistance.

 

 

 

Finally, we planted some seeds in an egg carton to get them started. They'll stay outside on nice days and inside on cold ones until the last frost hits our area, and then they'll be transplanted outside. Those big containers will hold cucumbers, sunflowers, and bell peppers. I'll be getting some smaller containers for cherry tomatoes, carrots, and zucchini. 

 

By this point, we'd been outside working for over an hour, and it was well past lunchtime. I hustled the kids in to watch a show, and I downed 20 ounces of Hydrate to replenish what I'd lost and to keep me going. 

 

Lunch was fixed and kids were put down for naps. And then Olli woke up 😂

 

No rest for Momma, but it was a fun morning!