It was in 2022 that I decided I needed a new hobby to keep me busy and keep me sane. The idea into getting behind gardening was a way to give myself time and space to immerse myself in nature by growing and nourishing plants of my own. I also wanted to grow my own produce just to have the bragging rights of saying a meal I prepared had farm to table elements. While gardening my go to quote after a good harvest was “It don’t get any fresher than picked from the dirt seconds ago!”. The gratification behind literally reaping what you sow is what made at home gardening automatically stick as one of my favorite all time hobbies.
Every day I’d upload a picture to my instagram story and called it ‘Garden Update’. Showcasing progress every few day to weeks. In 2022 I grew many things with pretty good success and the charm of my garden was that it was exclusively a container garden. A container garden is, as the name suggests a garden with plants grown in containers that could be 5 gallon buckets or grow bags. I used a combination of grow bags and plastic planters for the herbs. Each morning I’d thouroughly examine the plants for signs of pests or disease and if I noticed anything I’d used a mix of essential oils like lavender or mint to keep the bugs off of my plants. This method seemed to work pretty well. I carefully documented the success of my first gardening year and made some quality of life enchancements for the 2023 growing season. Unfortunately I never got to see my plans to fruition but with the changes I did make I noticed an immediate improvement in the quality of what I was able to grow.
A tomato plant started early in the growing season of 2023
For starters I opted for a high quality fertilizer and decided to treat my plants with neem oil for greater pest control. Miraculously when the time was right my salad bowl lettuce grew back big and tall for the 2023 growing season. I also planted my favorite go to herb ‘basil’ and some tomatoes I hoped to grow to harvest and make my first ever batch of fresh marinara sauce. But things happen plans changed and I had to leave my bustling garden behind.
It’s not all doom and gloom though I do plan on restarting my garden this year. The plan is to do a comprehensive guide on growing herbs. I’m going to detail the process step by step and getting creative by utilizing what I grow to create a special dish. As mentioned in a previous blog post a while ago fresh herbs can do wonders to enhance a dishes overall taste and palatability. After all it was gardening and documenting that journey and then tying it back to cooking that made me even want to start wtlg blogs. It is in starting this series that I hope to educate and entertain people on the wondrous world of gardening .
Stay tuned in the following weeks for an update on how things are going and check out our other blog posts as well!
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