Feeling the dirt between my fingers as I dug in the first of my baby plants, I felt optimistic. How hard could it be to grow vegetables? We’ve been doing this for hundreds of years, before the use of heavy machinery and sprays to control bugs. Yet, it was all completely new to me and I had no idea what I was doing (thank goodness for Google!).

It baffles me that horticulture isn’t taught as a core subject in schools, from primary through to the end of high school.

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The previous owner’s of the house were avid gardeners and created a haven for local wildlife. Every bush, tree, shrub and flower has a purpose. This includes the small pond in the bottom right corner and the hedgehog house (not pictured). The kind lady left me the greenhouse and plenty of bits and bobs to get me started. We didn’t touch the garden for that first season, other than cutting back the unruly blackberry bush at the end of Summer.

The first attempt

I raked and pulled out all of the weeds, turned over the soil and added a few bags of fresh compost over the top. Then it rained and I had a whole bed of weeds again! So, I repeated the above and headed off to the garden centre.

I was quite surprised at how much I could fit into my 3m x 2m raised bed. I had:
– Broccoli
-Cauliflower
-Kale
-Lettuce
-Carrots
-Onions
-Marigolds and nasturtiums for companion planting.

I’d read a little about netting from birds and bugs, so picked up some bendy plastic tubes and ordered my veggie mesh. That was it. All I needed to do now was water, weed and hope for lots of sunshine!

Healing

I’m a firm believer that we can help heal our bodies from the inside by making better food choices, but buying organic fruit and vegetables can be very expensive and lets be honest, there’s not a huge variety.

Having never been able to keep so much as a house plant alive, I’ve always wanted to grow as much of my own food as I could. Pesticides and other unknown products sprayed and used to grow our fruit and veg are wreaking havoc on our insides, especially women with PCOS! The last thing we need is more unbalanced hormones.

Its also really important to me that Avalyn knows where her food comes from. Now that she’s getting older, she can be a lot more involved.

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You don’t need to have a huge garden or a ton of space to grow a little something for yourself. Why not start with a planter on your patio or balcony? Herbs on a windowsill?

Let me know what you try! Happy Growing.

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