It’s backyard veggie garden time. Lettuce, kale, chard, mustard greens, peas, beets, arugula, fennel, mint, cilantro, tarragon, chives, parsley, thyme, lemon thyme, rosemary…

Last year we started in mid May although the raised bed was finished only1-2 weeks after. By mid June the lettuce was growing like crazy!

The year before, July 2008, we had a “veggie garden” in pots (so if you don’t have a little piece of land available for planting, you can do this in pots in a sunny spot. (Hey, a rhyme!))

This year we started earlier and we are a wee bit wiser and more knowledgeable. The raised bed is already there so all we had to do is buy 2 bags of compost to make it richer with nutrients and here’s Suburban Cowboy and our lil’girl working in the backyard, mixing last year’s soil with the new compost,

Ahhh, I love seeing other people work. But, wait a minute! Do you notice anything wrong in this picture? (I’ll tell you in a sec)

Hmm, somehow I don’t believe that working with that little shovel and sitting to rest and the project has just begun is going to make the job get done any time soon… It’s certainly not gonna get finished when you throw the soil out of the bed.

“Hey, You! Kid! In the blue shirt! We paid $$ for the manure*! Don’t throw it out on the grass. Hey! You! You’re supposed to keep it INSIDE, girl!”

* actually, I cannot stand the thought of chicken/cow manure in the yard and my kids splashing in the stuff, then bringing it home on the bottoms of their little shoes, so I buy a vegetarian compost.

Now, I’ll tell you what’s wrong with the previous photo, if you haven’t guessed it already… She’s got the baby sized blue shovel

And her dad too! Working the land with a blue kiddy shovel we bought for the kids at Costco years ago?

Now that is very manly. Only a guy so confident about his manhood will have the courage to do so, right?!

And Suburban cowboy is working hard. Believe me. Just look at that muscle!

Oops, wrong muscle.

Just look at THAT muscle!

“Suburban Cowboy, I’d say you need to tan a bit after months of cloudy winter and lots of indoors time. Get a little color on those muscles”

And may I add, “Your whiteness is blinding me”. I need my sunglasses.

He threatens me with a hose.

“Are you absolutely positively sure you want to do this, dude?”

He rethinks it, realizing it’s a bad, a very bad idea.

Now, that’s more like it; Put your hose where it belongs,

I go back in the house to do some cooking. It’s almost dinner time.

I love to sneak up on my family. See what they’re up to when they don’t know I’m watching them

… from behind…

“Suburban coooowboy, dinner’s reaaa-dy!”

“C’mon man.” He cannot stop.

“OK, 10 more minutes.”

“Nu? The kids are hungry”

He’s giving it another look…

See how he backs off, walking backwards? Bathing the bed with loving eyes…

“Say bye-bye….”

Until next time…

Are you growing any edible plants, veggies, or fruit this year?

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Suburban Cowboy cooks

Suburban Cowboy and the next generation

Urban garden, getting started

Categories : Urban garden