ow... ow... ow. Yay!
My mom loves gardening. She especially enjoys vegetable gardening, as it supplements the family diet with truly healthy food at a modicum of the grocery store cost. Combining thriftiness and a green thumb, growing vegetables is one of her only methods of relaxation.
Some people play tennis,
Some people erode the human soul,
My mom grows edibles.
She even has a garden area! It's raised and well-designed with plenty of spots with full-sun and variations of lighting options for the various plants she likes to grow. Usually it's green beans, carrots, cucumbers, zucchini and tomatoes. Number one on my mom's list of favorite foods to grow has to be tomatoes, hands down. She has known already what Alton Brown explained about tomatoes on Good Eats: they just taste better when home-grown (They contain a massively tasty flavor compound which gets destroyed by low temperatures. Chill a tomato and it will never be as tasty again!). She makes salads and burgers and tons of other things with tomatoes, but best of all is her home-made salsa! Mmmmmm... ^v^
In order to prep the garden for veggies each year, one must properly aerate and churn the soil. Aeration ensures available air to roots and also helps loosen the soil so that roots can spend more time sucking up water and nutrients instead of struggling to push their way through the dirt. Churning the soil helps distribute nutrients through the soil, such as those that may have sifted down too deep over the previous year. Adding more stuff like compost (AKA worm poo) and peat moss and maybe a little manure just help enrich the soil so that the plants are happily nomming on dirt and produce lots of veggies for US to nom upon!
The best way to achieve soil prep is a tiller. Tilling the soil with a digging fork just isn't as good as the motorized version that chews through the dirt like a mole.
One problem with this: Nobody living at my folks' house can operate a tiller. A tiller isn't easy to handle; they're nasty little blade-turning monstrosities that would just as readily till your toes as a clump of dirt. Plus, their general behavior is kind of like a miniature bucking bronco combined with a mastiff who really wants to go walkies. They leap and lurch and pull and twist around violently, and it takes a LOT of strength to keep one in check. You also have to be PAINFULLY aware of everything around you, to make sure that you or a family member or pet don't end up spending time getting body parts sewn back on or back together. My dad was forbidden from ever operating a tiller by unanimous family vote about ten years ago, when he mangled a hand in the tines. Note: NEVER try to pry out roots from a running tiller - this would seem to be obvious but as with all stupid stunts, my dad figured he was too good to get hurt. Caution is always the best course with these machines. I would far rather prefer to struggle with getting the motor started than risk bodily injury.
This leaves me as the sole family member capable of prepping the soil. Good thing that I love my mom and want to make her happy.
(The fact that I also love her salsa is another admitted benefit)
Today I rented a tiller, helped get the garden ready to till and then tilled for about three hours, working in some compost that was so full of happy little worms it looked like it was alive. I got that soil so well-worked that it just compacted like good snowball snow in the fist. It was dark, rich and moist. I also managed to get myself a nice sunburn in the process. Nothing severe but I will be feeling it in the morning. This always happens to me when I till the garden - doesn't matter how much sunblock I put on, I always end up a little cooked. I figure it's better than my dad's habit of shredding body parts on the tiller, though.
Then I took the tiller back to the rental place. On that return trip I also brought my mom along because her favorite garden center (located in Kent, WA, called Carpinito Brothers). There I helped her pick out several promising varieties of tomato plants as well as some pepper plants - I picked out some for myself too (mmm serrano and poblano!). She also picked up some seeds for other veggies. When we got to the checkout, I paid for the whole purchase which startled my mom - she had been planning on buying it all. Then we got home, set up the garden path and arranged where the tomatoes would be planted in the garden along with the peppers and some of the seeds of other things. I helped make dinner, and we finished the meal with just enough light left outside to get the tomatoes planted.
At the end of the night, I was sore, dirty, tired, sweaty and aching with my skin really starting to sting a little. However, it was all worth it to see my mom trying to hold back tears as she hugged me goodbye, telling me that she couldn't ask for a better son.
Some people play tennis,
Some people erode the human soul,
My mom grows edibles.
She even has a garden area! It's raised and well-designed with plenty of spots with full-sun and variations of lighting options for the various plants she likes to grow. Usually it's green beans, carrots, cucumbers, zucchini and tomatoes. Number one on my mom's list of favorite foods to grow has to be tomatoes, hands down. She has known already what Alton Brown explained about tomatoes on Good Eats: they just taste better when home-grown (They contain a massively tasty flavor compound which gets destroyed by low temperatures. Chill a tomato and it will never be as tasty again!). She makes salads and burgers and tons of other things with tomatoes, but best of all is her home-made salsa! Mmmmmm... ^v^
In order to prep the garden for veggies each year, one must properly aerate and churn the soil. Aeration ensures available air to roots and also helps loosen the soil so that roots can spend more time sucking up water and nutrients instead of struggling to push their way through the dirt. Churning the soil helps distribute nutrients through the soil, such as those that may have sifted down too deep over the previous year. Adding more stuff like compost (AKA worm poo) and peat moss and maybe a little manure just help enrich the soil so that the plants are happily nomming on dirt and produce lots of veggies for US to nom upon!
The best way to achieve soil prep is a tiller. Tilling the soil with a digging fork just isn't as good as the motorized version that chews through the dirt like a mole.
One problem with this: Nobody living at my folks' house can operate a tiller. A tiller isn't easy to handle; they're nasty little blade-turning monstrosities that would just as readily till your toes as a clump of dirt. Plus, their general behavior is kind of like a miniature bucking bronco combined with a mastiff who really wants to go walkies. They leap and lurch and pull and twist around violently, and it takes a LOT of strength to keep one in check. You also have to be PAINFULLY aware of everything around you, to make sure that you or a family member or pet don't end up spending time getting body parts sewn back on or back together. My dad was forbidden from ever operating a tiller by unanimous family vote about ten years ago, when he mangled a hand in the tines. Note: NEVER try to pry out roots from a running tiller - this would seem to be obvious but as with all stupid stunts, my dad figured he was too good to get hurt. Caution is always the best course with these machines. I would far rather prefer to struggle with getting the motor started than risk bodily injury.
This leaves me as the sole family member capable of prepping the soil. Good thing that I love my mom and want to make her happy.
(The fact that I also love her salsa is another admitted benefit)
Today I rented a tiller, helped get the garden ready to till and then tilled for about three hours, working in some compost that was so full of happy little worms it looked like it was alive. I got that soil so well-worked that it just compacted like good snowball snow in the fist. It was dark, rich and moist. I also managed to get myself a nice sunburn in the process. Nothing severe but I will be feeling it in the morning. This always happens to me when I till the garden - doesn't matter how much sunblock I put on, I always end up a little cooked. I figure it's better than my dad's habit of shredding body parts on the tiller, though.
Then I took the tiller back to the rental place. On that return trip I also brought my mom along because her favorite garden center (located in Kent, WA, called Carpinito Brothers). There I helped her pick out several promising varieties of tomato plants as well as some pepper plants - I picked out some for myself too (mmm serrano and poblano!). She also picked up some seeds for other veggies. When we got to the checkout, I paid for the whole purchase which startled my mom - she had been planning on buying it all. Then we got home, set up the garden path and arranged where the tomatoes would be planted in the garden along with the peppers and some of the seeds of other things. I helped make dinner, and we finished the meal with just enough light left outside to get the tomatoes planted.
At the end of the night, I was sore, dirty, tired, sweaty and aching with my skin really starting to sting a little. However, it was all worth it to see my mom trying to hold back tears as she hugged me goodbye, telling me that she couldn't ask for a better son.