Postcard From the Brown Thumb Gardener

I am a lazy gardener. Sometimes this works in my favor and sometimes it doesn't so much. I buy plants through the year and lovingly place them in my garden at just the right spot, but it took me a few years to remember to mark their location in some way. Because of this unfortunate oversight, I would promptly weed them out of my garden the next spring when they started to come up. Goodbye, money!

I am also a cheap gardener. If I can get something for freap (free/cheap) I am all over it. After these many years, I have also learned that if I plant perennials in my large patio pots it saves me money each spring on annuals to fill them with. Last year my bright plan was to put hosta in a pot. That would look awesome, and it did. Unfortunately it froze over winter and failed to come back this spring. I had no idea that you could kill hosta. I do now. This year? I bought bamboo to put in a pot. I have doubts as to the wisdom of this, but it was cheap (hello, ebay) so it's not like it's much money wasted. Plus how fun would it be to watch something that grows up to four inches per day? The kids are gonna love that. Provided that it grows.

This year's gardening moment that will live in history is from my vegetable garden. Last year I failed clean it out after the growing season the way that I should have and just let all that plant stuff sit over winter. This included my row of unused onions. What I learned was that onions will not die off over a very cold and harsh Pennsylvania winter, but instead will grow from those already in the ground. This makes it look like I had a huge head start on onion planting and my neighbors were in awe of my on-the-ball gardening prowess. What a score! Not only did I have to buy onion sets this spring, but I finally got them to grow early for a change. Chalk one up to laziness. Go, me!

Now that my lettuce is big enough to eat, I've been pulling up an onion or two for salads. Turns out that leftover onions are tough and woody. Not so good in the eating department. So much for Go, Laziness! Next year I'll go to the store and buy onion sets like everyone else.

Live and learn.

(Can you believe that spellcheck doesn't like the word hosta? Hosta. Hosta is a plant that every gardener can recognize, and before this year I thought it was impossible to kill. Get with the program, spellcheck.)

8 comments:

Michelle said...

Ok, seriously WHAT are onion sets? I want to grow onions, and I'm wondering if they were the tiny dried up little onion like thing I saw in buckets in the store this spring but ... I never asked.

And you CAN kill a hosta? Wow, that's one plant I haven't killed off yet. Nicely done!

the planet of janet said...

i can totally take you in the brown thumb department. i actually killed one of those unkillable lucky bamboo plants.

i rock.

Leanne said...

Hmm. Maybe I should orderme some bamboo.

I can't kill Hosta either and I always thought there was only two types - green and varigated (sp?), I learned at a graden tour this weekend there are many. Who knew?

CanadianMama said...

I planted a "garden" for the first time this year and it's not doing so well.
Maybe it's because I don't know what a hosta is...

Karen Deborah said...

so what is the little photo a broccoli head? The hosta probably died because it was in a pot? I dunno but in the ground they can take just about anything. So how is the bamboo working out?

You know it's not like you don't have anything to do, 4 kids, 8 dogs, a goat, pigs, people, a pile of Woody toys, painting walls, potty training,...no not much to do at all, maybe you should take up gardening in your spare time!

Lazy my butt..

AutoSysGene said...

Wow, you killed a hosta? That takes special skill...nicely done...gardening master!!

HalfAsstic.com said...

Anyone who gardens is not lazy! And as far as spell check goes, mine is skitsofrenick. Sometimes it can spell anything I start to put up and other times it gets stuck on the simplest things. Now, if it could just correct my run-on sentences and fragments. ;-)

Viv said...

Next time you make it out to Florida, would you please stop by and kill mine? It has taken over my already nonexistent yard.