Milestones in the Gardening Season
By Cindy Naas
Gardening is repetitive but never boring.
As the years pass and you become ever more familiar with your garden, there will always be milestones you begin to anticipate, some even in the dead of winter.
Here are a few of my favorite milestones in my garden:
New Seedlings: When the first lettuce, carrot or beet seedlings push through the earth for the first time each season, I am overjoyed! I know that it will happen, it’s why I plant the seeds. However, getting that confirmation that yes, my garden still does work properly is a cause for celebration, and a sign that a lot of work and joy lies ahead.
Pesto: Tonight I am going to serve this season’s first batch of pesto. This is something I look forward to all year long, and so do my children. The anticipation has been building since we brought home the basil seedlings, even when we had to replace them after the first bunch were destroyed by hail. My goal is to make enough to eat and enough to freeze with each batch I make. This winter, when it seems the snow will never go away, I’ll eat some of this pesto and remember my lovely sun-warmed garden- and most likely, will become even more impatient for gardening season to arrive.
Tomatoes: It’s always hard to mark the arrival of the first tomato. I have squirrels and raccoons competing for the privilege of eating that first red ripe fruit. I also have to compete with my own children, who don’t see any reason to allow mom to have the honour of eating the first one. However, when there are enough red ripe tomatoes to make that first salad, that is what I wait for. The very first tomato is exciting, but the plants bending with an abundance of them is what I really look forward to every year.
Aromatic Herbs: when the lavender and rosemary are ready for drying is one of my favourite weeks of summer. The scent of lavender wafting through my home makes me smile even when I wake in the middle of the night, and with careful planning it is a pleasure I can enjoy all winter long.
Strawberries: The first strawberry blossom in the spring brings out all the maternal instincts my youngest child can muster. He fusses over his strawberries, and for the entire summer there is no other patch of my garden which is tended as carefully. It is rare that a weed lasts for more than a couple of days in his patch, and he waters them faithfully, even during rainy weather. The berries themselves are anticlimactic to me- what I look for is the joy my son takes in caring for his small piece of land. We grow the ever bearing variety, and last night as I was presented with a small ripe berry, I hoped that this child will receive a similar gift from his child when he is grown.
These are my favorite times in the garden.
What are some of your milestones?
August 22nd, 2008 at 3:57 am
Our favorite milestone during the year is when we can walk outside and it just smells green. The soil is warm and sweet smelling and the tomato vines and other veggies put out a heady scent when they are touched by the sun. mmmmm… If I could bottle that smell for us all year long…
We’re also finding that right now the scents of drying dill, lavender, rosemary and our other herbs is very nice. They whole house smells like some cozy cottage where the herbs hang from the rafters.
August 22nd, 2008 at 9:06 am
-When my indoor starts sprout
-When I can first turn the soil after the winter
August 23rd, 2008 at 12:11 pm
Actually just re-starting a garden this year after a three year hiatus. I don’t know how in the world that I stayed away from it so long or let unimportant things keep me away from it rather. I just know that as soon as I see the first sign of life out there, it just moves me from within my core and then some.