Garden & grow your own!Like millions of others, I found my focus drifting all over the place during 2020.
Yes, I had a garden. I sometimes think it’s the only thing that kept me sane in a world knocked off center by COVID 19. We’ve been sheltering in place since February 27, 2020 when my husband was hospitalized with Type A flu.
Our lives turned inward and we stayed home. I’ve been an organic gardener for close to 30 years, always playing with dirt, planting, harvesting, enjoying the quiet mornings with my trowel and my dogs.
This year didn’t feel different from years past. January planning. February starting cool weather crops indoors – lettuce, beets, spinach and kale. March, getting my tomato and pepper seeds in cells and on heat mats. April, starting eggplant and transplanting the baby greens and beets outdoors.
Using saved seeds, 25 year old trays and cells and some dirt is where I started in late Winter, 2020. You are looking at where I finished in June. Tomatoes, lettuce, spinach, eggplant, peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, green beans all in the ground, growing our food in my backyard. Cherries, figs, blueberries and blackberries provided desserts, jams and brandies.
My husband and I ate like royalty from March to November. We cooked wonderful, tasty treats like eggplant parmesan and scallopine. I gardened with a vengeance, working until I was worn out. But I did not write about what I was doing. I couldn’t. Like many, I was paralyzed by all the turmoil and death rolling across our once great country.
Now, there is some light shining through all the darkness of 2020. Now I feel some hope, knowing that this horrible year with its divisiveness, disease and dangerous politics is ending. Now I want to share what I know so you can grow food in your backyard or on your patio or deck. I want to help you grow so you are never at the mercy of the “supply chain” again.
In 2021, I plan on sharing everything I know about gardening to help you get started. Why?
1. It is SOOOOOO easy to grow your own food.
2. The food you grow is SOOOOOO tasty and healthful.
3. The produce you can, dry or freeze will help warm even the coldest winter day.
BONUS: If you have kids, the garden is one of the best classrooms you will ever spend time in. Math, biology, geometry, chemistry – you can teach all of them just by looking at a cup of dirt!
Join me to see how easy it is to get started and how little it costs! Every week, I will share 30 years of tips and tricks to help you get growing and give you the tools and know how to make it possible for you to feed your family almost for free!
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Please, just think about starting a garden. If you do, your back yard will look like mine by June and you will be dining like royalty all year long!
Peace on Earth…and shovels deep in it!
Happy New Year, everyone.
Grow So Easy Organic 
I love this! So happy to hear you are well and promoting something so wonderful, GARDENING! ❤ ❤ ❤
Sending love and best wishes your way for a bright and beautiful 2021.
Right back at you beautiful girl! If I can help just one person to take a chance and start growing, it will be worth it. Happy New Year!
Hi Pat,
Thanks for your awesome and inspirational post. I too gardened but didn’t write anything about it, not once. I wish you and your garden all the best for 2021 and I will look forward to your garden tips this year! With much affection, Chrystal
I hope 2021 is a beautiful, peaceful year of love and joy….and, of course, gardening!
It is amusing that so many rediscovered gardening, or discovered it for the first time, during this time. I instead found more of what I could find growing wild in the forest outside of the garden, and gave the garden less attentions than I should have.
I think it’s fantastic that so many people have started gardening in their back yards! This year brought a terrible wake up call with it but if people can turn it into food, teach lessons with it, grow together as a family, I am all for it. If we have one thing to thank COVID for it is people rediscovering family and home…and garden.
It would be gratifying if some people realize how disconnected they are from gardening, and try to learn a bit more about it. That is something that has always worried me. I live in a region that was formerly famous for orchard production, but became infested my millions of people who have no interest in horticulture, or even going outside. Seriously, we live in the best climate in the World, with excellent soil, but the millions of people who now live here have no appreciation for it.
Merry Christmas Tony! I feel your frustation and I can relate. I think this is why I want to share what I know. If I can tease one person out into the back yard they have given their life to own and if I can get them to plant some seeds, I know I will feel better about this planet we live on. I can’t save everyone; maybe I can save just one.
Also, we can make things a bit more pleasant for everyone, even if they do not realize it. I enjoyed planting street trees in the Los Angeles region with Brent, not to get anyone else to enjoy horticulture, but because so many enjoy the trees. Whether or not they go outside and enjoy gardening, they appreciate the improvement of the scenery and increased shade.
Sometimes softly is the best way to open eyes. Love that you are a tree planter!
Well, I am normally just a tree grower. We just started planting trees because there was a situation that benefited from them, and I happened to have a slightly non-marketable batch of trees . . . for a few years consecutively. My colleague, who really plants things still does it.