Happy New Year's Eve & My First Year Part 1

It's been 1 year since I started this blog!!! I can't believe 2012 starts tomorrow!  It was a crazy year.  Lots of good things happened in the midst of bad things.  Overall, I think it was a pretty good year.  I went from being unemployed and financially stressed to being rehired by my old employer and not making a whole lot of money but enough to live comfortably in the South.  I went from crappy apartment living dealing with stupid drunk college students puking and fighting by the old apartment every weekend to renting a small house with a yard! The best thing of all was discovering gardening and that I didn't have a crusty, black thumb.  Gardening was my one solace in my time of stress and anxiety. Thanks Mother Nature! Anyway, in the beginning of the year, I started a Wish List. I definitely did not accomplish everything but I think I had a good start.  Here's a little recap at least Part 1 and what's going on this weekend as a new year begins....

Part 1: Gardening:
Last Dec. when I started this blog, one of my goals was to learn how to garden and to start a container garden on my balcony.  Here's my humble beginnings as a novice gardener...

My container garden

And now I've gone a little seed crazy and am in the process of planning raised beds. In fact, I ordered more seeds over the holidays and they came yesterday!!  Can I just say that I LOVE Baker Creek right now!  Not only did my seeds come in record time but they sent me a free gift AGAIN!! I was not expecting that after the first time.  LOVE THEM!

newly purchased seeds

BONUS seeds!

My ever growing seed collection

This winter has been unusually warm.  I think it's almost in the 70s today but in anticipation of a cold snap coming this week, I bought a mini green house from of all places.... Big Lots!

My green thumb of a mom gave me Korean perilla, garlic chives and peppers last spring.  The chives flourished but unfortunately, due to a gnat infestation, my perilla plants did not survive.

Garlic chives

Garlic chives successfully going to seed

This morning while I was out in the yard setting up the mini greenhouse.  I decided to clean out the planter that held my chive plants. I had let it die back for the winter and was pulling out the dead plants to throw in my compost pile and lo and behold, what do I find?.....

My chives have started to grow again!  Crazy plant! I had let some of the seeds drop instead of collecting them.  My mother did say that the chives were pretty invasive and hardy.  I think I'll just let nature takes it's course! 
My pepper plants were a bit of a struggle last spring.  I really didn't think they would survive.

But they flourished with a little bone meal and epsom salt spraying and I was able to collect a nice crop of ripe red peppers for drying...

Gardening has definitely been a great learning experience.  I've had wonderful successes beyond the chives and peppers including successfully growing Italian and Thai basils from cuttings.  Learning how to save seeds ( I saved both basil plant seeds and I have Italian basil sprouting right now as well as saving chive seeds).  I've had failures besides my perilla plants.  My marigolds ended up with white mold and eventually died.  My nasturtiums never really flowered or grew very well. My cilantro was a complete failure- they never grew. The dreaded gnat infestation was a total pain in my ass.  I had squirrels attack all of my potted plants and they nearly killed my stonecrop plants.
So what have I learnend?  I've come to realize that for the most part, when I neglected my plants, they did much better. Go figure.  I think in the past, I was overly concerned about killing my plants and over-watered most of the time, which eventually killed the plants in the end. It also pays to really read up on the variety of plant you want to grow and PLAN! I've come to really love container gardening!  I think it's the way to go for any novice gardener. I think it really helped me to understand the needs of each plant. Finally, companion planting is essential especially if you don't want to use pesticides.  I don't think it solves all of the pest problems but it certainly helps.
I really can't wait for spring.  I'm so psyched about starting raised beds. The idea of eating fresh fruits and veggies right out of the garden sounds so amazing.  I really hope all of the research and reading I've done in prep for the spring pays off!

xoxo