Let us not forget that the cultivation of the earth is the most important labor of man. When tillage begins, other arts will follow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of civilization. ~Daniel Webster
Do you have a garden? Have you ever had a garden? When I looked for quotes for this post, most of the quotes were about flower gardens. Guess vegetable gardens aren’t what we like to imagine most. But those vegetable gardens have made a difference in what’s on people’s table and on mine too. We’ve had fresh vegetables out of a garden on our table ever since I can remember. My family always had a garden with beans, tomatoes, corn and more. In the spring, the garden got plowed and planted. After I married, for a while, I just shared my parents’ garden to can beans and tomatoes and whatever they had more than they needed.
Of course, Mom helped me. I was so young when I married, barely 17, that Mom was afraid I wouldn’t take the proper care while using that pressure canner. I would have and did when I finally was given the canner to take home with me when Mom stopped gardening and canning after Dad died. I had heard plenty of stories about untended canners blowing up. If mine had ever blown up, I’d have gotten it full force since I was always standing right by the stove watching the gauge showing the proper pressure. Mom’s warnings were effective.
The love of gardening is a seed once sown that never dies. ~Gertrude Jekyll
I don’t know if I could say the love of gardening was a seed growing in me. It was simply something that had to be done to make sure we had vegetables on our table. I’ve put many vegetable gardens in my stories. In Angel Sister, Kate and Evie had to can the beans with Aunt Hattie’s help on a woodburning cookstove. Talk about a hot job. In These Healing Hills, Fran has to pick beans and learn how to string them up for shuckie beans, a mountain staple in the days before electricity. It was a way of drying green beans for the winter. The mountain people all had their sass patches. That was the mountain lingo for vegetable gardens. If they had a flower garden, they called them a blossom patch. Jocie and her dad in the Heart of Hollyhill books didn’t raise their own vegetables, but their church family made sure they were supplied. Jocie is always wishing the church people grew more strawberries or tomatoes and much less cabbage and zucchini.
“There is a tale…It tells of the days when a blight hung over our land. Nothing prospered. Nothing flourished. Not even zucchini would grow.” ~Golden: A Retelling of Rapunzel
And of course, the Shaker stories always have gardens in them. I often let my Shaker characters pick strawberries and beans. In The Refuge Leatrice has to help pick beans. The young sisters had to do their part in the Shaker villages. I like putting gardens in my stories. I know about planting seeds and harvesting the vegetables and wishing for rain at the right times to be sure your beans and tomatoes grow. And since I usually set my stories in Kentucky in a rural area, gardens just belong.
Weather means more when you have a garden. There’s nothing like listening to a shower and thinking how it is soaking in around your green beans. Marcelene Cox
We’ve grown all sorts of vegetables over the years. Cantalope, watermelon, beans of all sorts, even those purple beans I talk about in These Healing Hills. Tomatoes, of course. Potatoes and sweet potatoes. Peppers of various types. Cucumbers. (Way too many this year.) Corn. (Not lately because the raccoons got it all.) Turnips and greens. Pumpkins. Even eggplant once. (Pretty but nobody ate it.) And now that we don’t need as much garden space as when the kids were young, I raise flowers. Zinnias. Sunflowers. Cosmos. Marigolds and more. The butterflies love our flower rows.
“Plants want to grow; they are on your side as long as you are reasonably sensible.” ~
So what do you like to grow in your gardens, if you have one? If you don’t, what would be the vegetable you think would be most fun to pick out of your imagined garden?
Comments 12
I’ve been busy with my garden and canning. We had very few green beans this year as it was to wet and the plants kept rotting. Most everything else has done well.
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We were late getting our garden out, Lucy. All the rain and most of the garden is my son’s these days since we don’t need as much stuff for the two of us. He has a family and a wife who likes to do the canning, etc. He does have to do the bean picking which is a chore since they like bunch beans. We still put out pole beans for us since my husband prefers those. They’re more work at the beginning but a big easier to pick. This year the too much rain turned to not enough rain. So I don’t know how many beans we’ll get. I’m hoping for more tomatoes. Love a garden tomato. Sounds as though you’ve got some good veggies for the winter.
I noticed your row of flowers, very pretty. My Mom always planted a row of flowers in her “vegetable” garden. And I love eggplant, peel and cook then fix just like you would an oyster casserole with the milk and crackers.
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I enjoy my flowers in the garden, Janice. I get to have bouquets in the house of zinnias and more. And I did hear more about how to cook that eggplant after I was sort of lost when I grew one years ago. Nowadays, I could just look on the computer for recipes. 🙂
I miss canning green beans and beets and tomatoes and juice. When my arm gave out pulverizing the tomatoes for juice my husband took over for me , he could get more juice out of them. We worked together on canning day only I did all the snapping f the beans, he maned the pressure cooker and removed the jars, he liked to hear them pop. Those days are long passed but are treasured memories that I will never forget. I still have my large pressure canner and the hot water bath cooker for juice and tomatoes, but I no longer use them, also miss the taste of home canned veggies.
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I don’t can as much as I used to, Donna. Now I do green beans and sometimes pickles. I don’t have as many tomatoes as in the past, but when I do gather enough tomatoes I like to make a red tomato relish. Don’t think that will happen this year. Too dry and the plants fire up from some kind of disease. Always something. Sounds as though you and your husband worked well together. My husband will help with the snapping of beans and sometimes the picking, but I do the canning. I too like hearing the jars pop sealed. 🙂
We used to have a small garden, but now we just plant in pots and tubs. We’ve tried straw bale gardening for about 3 years, but it wasn’t great. All we want is some fresh tomatoes and cucumbers. My son has a small garden and plants corn, watermelons, and sweet potatoes, he shares with us. I also have a lot more flowers than I do vegetables.
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Flowers are nice, Connie, and don’t have to be canned. Just enjoyed. We have a couple of tubs with tomato plants. I’m thinking maybe next year we can add a couple. Maybe do some early spring lettuce. I always loved the lettuce out of the beds we used to put out in the spring. Sounds like you have the best idea of sharing your son’s garden abundance. 🙂
Since we have a small yard, and much of it is shaded, we grow vegetables only in pots on our patio, which receives full sun. In our hot climate in Houston, TX, we find that okra, eggplant, and peppers grow well. When it’s not scorching hot, tomatoes grow well, and we’ve grown lettuce, Swiss chard, carrots, beets, and squash of various kinds. However, we also belong to a veggie co-op with weekly deliveries from a farm north of where we live. We receive abundant supplies of a great variety of vegetables along with some fruits. Delicious and nutritious!!!
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Sounds as if that veggie co-op is the thing, Suzanne. Fresh produce. The fresh fruits sound great. We have a couple of tomatoes in pots, but that does take some watering. That might not be easy in a hot climate like Texas. Even here the pots have been drying out very quickly, because we’ve had some hot weather too . But you’ve certainly tried a variety in your container garden.
I used to have a garden and I guess what I liked best was tomatoes. I would love to go out and pick a tomato and eat it warm. I also grew okra one time because I liked the flowers. I no longer have a garden but my neighbor invites me to eat what is growing in his. I think I’ll wander over there and see what he has growing.
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I hope you found some goodies to bring home from your neighbor’s garden when you wandered over. Maybe even a tomato. You are right about how good they are fresh off the vine, still sun warmed, Birdie. I always liked eating the little cherry tomatoes that way. We don’t have any of those this year, but we have a loaded down plant or two or romas. Seem slow to ripen or maybe I’m just impatient. 🙂