My farmerhood continues….
I actually have quite a few things growing and have been able to use some of my herbs in my cooking! As I expected, many things never even popped out of the ground (or the iguana chowed them down before I ever got to see them) so it’s been a bit of excitement to watch what is actually growing and what isn’t. Here’s what I have so far:
A little patchy, but none the less….a garden!
Basil, Cilantro, and Parsley….I also planted lavender last week, but that doesn’t seem to be sprouting yet.
Parsley!To Alex’s great dismay, my parsley is much more prolific than my cilantro (I hate cilantro, he loves it). I have been using this parsley to make homemade salsa.
Basil!This basil is looking a little thin right now, but that’s because I picked nearly every big leaf a few days ago and made a giant batch of pesto. We had pesto pizza with spinach and black olives on Sunday night and pesto pasta with fresh parmesan last night.
The iguana still seems to be nibbling on the leaves, but apparently he is getting full before he makes his way through all of it, so I have plenty left for my own use.
I just planted this new purple basil. I thought it would be pretty to mix with the green basil, plus how cool looking would purple pesto be!?You also may notice that the dirt looks a little red…that is not special Honduran dirt…that is special Caitlin gardening. I have taken to dumping chili powder on my plants to deter the iguana. It appears to be working! I had to buy the economy sized chili powder at the grocery store, but now I go out there 2-3 times a week and spice up all my plants so that he burns his tongue. Take that Iggy!
Parsley and Basil
Carrots!I didn’t notice these for the last few months (I wasn’t so consistent with my weeding), but now that I’ve singled them out they seem to be doing pretty well.
Tomatoes!My tomatoes are really growing! We even had to make a trip to Ace (my favorite store in SPS) to get the metal tomato grower things (I’m so garden vocabulary accurate)! This is my tallest plant, it’s probably about 2 feet tall.
I have 3 major tomato plants right now, but I’m working on getting more.Because I’m not so good at thinning….it’s like torture to pull out things that are actually growing!…I’ve been digging up and replanting the rest of the tomato plants so they are slowly starting to take over almost 1/2 of my garden space.
Anybody know what this is?Since I am still very new at this whole gardening thing I have quite the time deciphering between plant and weed. I am also terrified of pulling out things that are actually what I planted so I tend to let the weeds take over until I’m absolutely sure they aren’t right.
This plant is growing where I planted scallions, but since I have no idea what scallions look like….
Pretty much anything that appears to be in a row, I leave in the ground. If the weeds got smart and started growing in rows I would never pull them out!
How about this? Look familiar to anyone?I think I may have planted some kind of jalapeño in this area, but like the scallions, I don’t know what a jalapeño plant looks like….
From Russia with Love 
the first plant you asked about I think is a weed,but a very pretty one.The second one doesn’t really look like scallions.I could be wrong on both but thought I would give it a try. Did you save the packages the seeds came in? That might give you a clue.Your garden looks great and there is nothing better than being able to go out your back door and pick fresh vegetables or herbs. Hans says that every time he goes out and picks some dill for his caviar sandwich.We still have dill but not for long, it froze last night.
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Congrats on your garden! The second plant you asked about does look like some sort of pepper, so if you planted a jalapeno that’s probably it.I’ve been growing basil, too, it’s so nice to have fresh basil wit everything. I read somewhere that cutting off a stalk is better than picking off the individual leaves because it encourages more growth. I’ve been doing this with my basil plants this year and none have gone to seed yet. (Although they’re grown inside, so that might have something to do with it too.)
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my guess-it is in the legume family,looks like mimosa or possibly acacia.kathy/mom
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