Homeschoolers and Gardening...the Best!!

 Thursday - February 5, 2026 saw an influx of 25 youngsters from a home-school group at the garden.  Some of the kids were late and didn't make it into the photo op at the beginning of our garden experience.

Everyone helped give the onions a "haircut" so more energy could be put into growing the bulb of the onions.  There were a lot of onions to trim!

They got to sample kale and broccoli, and discovered that fresh broccoli is really good to eat, including the stems!!  They thought the really long leaf of kale sticking out of my mouth looked like a green tongue!

And, of course, it takes lot ot work to get the beds ready to plant, so they helped with digging the walkways and throwing the dirt into the beds...

While the kids were planting the peanut bed (oops, no pictures!) the moms helped rake the beet bed that the kids just planted.

The Winter Thaw is Here! HOORAY!!!

 Last year (2025) we didn't get our normal winter thaw and we really missed it!  It's back in 2026 and may even last three weeks!!

We met at the garden today and planted 250 onion sets that we grew, cleaned out the bulk of dead flowers in the flower bed, planted a small patch of Little Marvel Peas, cleared out some of the walkways, disconnected most of the pipes and moved them so rototilling can begin.  We got a lot of leaves out from the shed area, and put two very full trashcans out for pickup on Monday.  It was a great work party!!  AND we're especially grateful to the "bucket fairy" who procured a bunch of buckets for the garden!!  We were down to about 2 or 3 buckets!!

More to come in the coming week!!

We still have some wedding to do!!  

PEANUT HARVEST and MORE!!

 Saturday, October 18th was the perfect time for people to come and harvest the peanuts...and other veggies!!  This is SUCH a fun thing for kids to do, and we had a great turnout!  

We dug up all of the peanuts and stripped them off the plants...let everyone pick some corn, and we picked a few pumpkins, cucumbers, butternut squash, and some BIG sweet potatoes.  And we did it all in ONE HOUR!!!  Who says gardening isn't fun???  It's a blast!!

We are starting to remove some of the tomato plants and

harvesting green tomatoes before it freezes in a few more weeks.

Believe it or not, this is just from a couple of our sweet

potato mounds...

The adults dug up the peanut plants, and the kids and

adults did the rest...

 

Harvest Time!!

 We have had BEATUFUL Fall weather and the garden has LOVED IT!!  Friday night, October 10th, we finally got the downpour that had been predicted for a few days.  I could almost hear the garden slurping up all that luscious water!!  

On Saturday, we had some great helpers come to garden.  They picked some beautiful corn, cucumbers, butternut squash, a few strawberries, okra, a couple of pumpkins, some peanuts AND some giant sweet potatoes.  (Watch the video below!)  Everyone had so much fun!!

  

 

     

FALL CORN...and more!

Our normal planting of sweet corn on July 25th was a flop!!  We had bad seed...someone harvested a hybrid (most of that seed will be sterile...or not true to it's parent...) and VERY few seeds germinated out of the three beds we planted!!  Luckily, Judy Holly was willing to replant with some other seed...(I was SO bugged I didn't want to even try!)  It is growing very well...it may be a couple of weeks late, but it's growing!!  THANK YOU, JUDY!!

On Monday (Labor Day) we had a work party to clear out all of the spurge that decided to pop up when we got a couple of days of rain (after a dry spell since April!)  Spurge was everywhere in the walkways between the corn beds, but with our knives in hand, we sliced the dirt and pulled the weeds up very effectively.  

The tomato plants are slowing down, but some are still producing.  The sweet potatoes are going crazy with vines everywhere, and the peanuts are thriving!  We did a fall planting of beans (not great germination), peas (poor germination) and a few beets.  The flower bed is winding down, but still has some flowers producing.  It has been a great year!!