Attempt #328947

So, one of my last posts was about my brown thumb.  This post is about my attempt (#328947) to turn it green.

Picking the Right Variety

As I previously mentioned, I have always been envious of people and their natural ability to grow things.  I also mentioned that I never seemed to have trouble helping my parents with their gardening (fruits and vegetables, not houseplants).  Now that spring is here, I’m making my millionth attempt at growing something, or some things.  I’ve decided to leave houseplants in the past because they have proven their ability to defeat me.  This time I bought tomatoes, peppers, and lettuce.  I made sure to buy the right variety (the kind that can grow in planters, since I don’t have an actual yard).

Trip to Home Depot… and Lowes

From my experiences gardening with my parents, I knew I needed a mixture of soil and manure.  My boyfriend (Daniel)read the instructions on the tomato pot and said, “It says to just plant in soil.  You don’t want to screw these up too!”  I said, “Sometimes you have to do a little more than what the directions say.  Remember those homemade cinnamon sugar tortilla chips you burned?  You followed the directions to a T!”  Quick segue here, there are people who LOVE instructions when it comes to cooking, gardening, etc.  I am not one of those people… Daniel is.  I don’t like following recipes when I cook… he does.  He thought I should follow the directions on the tomato pot… I REFUSE!  Anyway, I pulled out my handy-dandy iPhone (No, I did not use Siri.  She doesn’t like me) and I called my parents!  I wanted to make sure I bought the right things, in order to make my plants actually grow.  They said the manure/humus mix combined with vegetable soil would be perfect.

Plant ’em!

Can I just say, there was some weird stuff in the manure/humus.  Is this gum?!!  Ok, it probably wasn’t gum, but you never know what cows eat.  Moving on… I mixed the soil with the manure/humus, planted everything, watered it, watched my cat try to demolish everything I had just done, then sat there and stared, just waiting for it to grow.  (The last part is not true).

Perfect Weather

The weather here has been SO perfect for gardening.  It’s been sunny on the weekend and somewhat rainy during the week.  My plants are getting nice fresh water and energizing sunlight from good ol’ Mother Nature.  My kitty cat seems to like it too.  Although she’s not a fan of BEING in the rain, she does enjoy watching it from our nicely covered deck.  Look at this sweet little picture I took of her on the sunny day I was gardening!  Isn’t she precious?

What have your experiences with vegetable gardening been like?  I’m hoping to have some nice plump red tomatoes by summer!