Photo Credit: Fall garden by Indy Kethdy’s used under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

By Mindy McIntosh-Shetter

I am always sad when it comes to the end of a gardening season.

I think about the dishes I fixed, funny stories that I will share with my friends and how I and my garden have grown together.

This year, I have also thought about what the future holds for me and my family.

My family dynamics have changed. I am now an empty nester whose children visit for the fresh produce they miss.

I am also getting older and issues in the garden that drove me crazy in the past just seem to be part of life instead of an intrusion on my time. But as I walk down the garden path of the past, I also need to be cleaning it up so that I have a clean palate for the next garden season.

The first thing I do at the end of the season is to Read the rest of this entry »

Photo Credit: Red Bibb Lettuce by Justin Leonard used under CC BY 2.0

By Mindy McIntosh-Shetter

Gardening year round is one way I keep my food budget low or at least my vegetable cost.

But I cannot grow everything year round without a greenhouse and pollinators.

Below is a list of my favorite vegetables to grow in the fall and early spring along with some of my favorite out of the season growing techniques.

• Bibb lettuce which is a wonderful addition to any salad and wilted with bacon, hard boiled eggs and a vinegar-based salad dressing.
• Kale which is a superb green that is highly nutritious and easy to fix. It makes a wonderful salad raw, steamed and/or wilted with bacon and apples.
• Spinach is another highly nutritious green that can be eaten raw, cooked, sautéed, and creamed.

The techniques for growing these wonderful greens abound but I have found 3 simple techniques that do not require special equipment and/or commitment.

1. Growing in a pot. Greens are very Read the rest of this entry »

Photo Credit: Tomato Plant by Suzy Glass used under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

By Mindy McIntosh-Shetter

As an organic gardener and one of Native American heritage, I love to do things as natural as possible.

When my children were babies that included cloth diapers, homemade baby food and breastfeeding.

Back then I was viewed as a little weird but now these behaviors are becoming more common and in doing so more acceptable.

My “back to nature movement” was not limited to childrearing but also to my home and garden. I took down walls because I wanted a home that was more open and natural looking. I did not want to be limited by four walls.

I ripped my carpet up and laid Read the rest of this entry »

Photo Credit: Green Bean Teepee by David Silver used under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

By Mindy McIntosh-Shetter

One of my favorite gardening stories I have has to do with my children and my local library’s reading program.

The story begins with my children and I going to the library to pick up some books for their summertime reading program.

While my children searched for their favorite topics and stories, I was looking for the classics.

This included some I enjoyed as a child and some that had a moral lesson I hoped to teach them. My son picked out books on cars and dinosaurs will my daughter picked out books on animals. I picked out a book on children’s fables.

Before going home that day, we also stopped off at the feed and seed so that I could pick up some garden seed. Radishes, cucumbers, lettuce, and watermelon seed were a few I selected along with green beans. While this single step may seem to be insignificant, it was an important event that would set the rest of the summer.

So the next day, I set out to plant my new seeds. Lettuce was planted first Read the rest of this entry »

Photo Credit: Rain Water by Eric Schmuttenmaer used under CC BY-SA 2.0

By Mindy McIntosh-Shetter

This past week, I have been on vacation.

As I drove to my destination, I noticed a common thread that seemed to connect cornfield-to-cornfield and lawn-to-lawn.

This simple connection is one that affects man and beast, caused wars and starvation, destroys economics and livelihoods, and we cannot live without it.

One may be wondering what this is and the answer is as close as your kitchen sink. This all-powerful connection is water.

If you are a gardener you understand the importance of water and how it can change a fertile garden space into a desolate tract of land or, on the other hand, it can change a garden of weeds into a fertile piece of terra firma. In my area, this is so true since we have had no rain for two months.

But while a water shortage can have Read the rest of this entry »