More with the garden...

My kingdom for a solid two acres!

Even with the little space I have, I was able to add a bit more. Saturday morning I picked up some plants in Fresno. I was able to get corn, lemon cucumber, bell peppers and a jalapeno. A little more about the corn.

Zannie told me something about using corn as a trellis for green beans. Intrigued, I did a search and found an awesome website about trellising. (God, I love the internet.) My only disappointment was that using corn as a trellis required planting it two to three weeks prior to the green beans. Even though my beans haven't shown their green little heads, I worried that the corn wouldn't grow fast enough. So...I wrote a reminder in my gardening journal to try it next year.

You can then imagine my excitement when I found pony packs of corn seedlings at the Fresno OSH. I nearly jumped up and down in the aisle of the store. Because I'm a mature, mother of almost two, I merely squealed, "CORN! Oh my God! Corn!!!" (In much the same way as my co-worker's teenage daughter would yell out, "ZAC EFRON!!! He's sitting right there!!!") In other words, totally played it cool.

After we got home on Saturday, we went outside and planted all the peppers, cucumber and corn - guesstimating where the green beans were already planted. Then, because I'm a total gardening nerd, I re-planted the lettuce and added a six pack of strawberries for Joseph.

So far the casualty count is fairly low:

• Lost the lettuce and spinach to some sort of creature.


• One of the bell pepper plants is looking puny, but there's still hope.


• Joseph's football landed in the zucchini and broke the sprouts off at the root. The leaves are still green, so I hope there a chance at recovery.


• The cucumbers never sprouted so we bought plants. (Now watch the seeds suddenly start sprouting.)

My peas are doing wonderfully. They're clambering up their trellis like champs. The grapes are still two sticks in the ground. The berries are still leafing out. The tomatoes are growing. The cauliflower actually has an extra few leaves. The radishes, carrots, garlic and onions are looking amazing. The healthy zucchini aren't really doing anything and the bell peppers are still trying to figure out if they like our yard.

I think I need to go away for a week so I can see some real progress. This waiting is killing me!