Well, I finally finished reading Heirloom Vegetable Gardening but while I was reading it, I also managed to finish a couple of other books!  The Heirloom Vegetable Gardening tome is a great volume and I would like to have a copy of it on my gardening bookshelf for future reference.  Now, on to the other books …

I read Something from the Oven while I was in Asheville for my mom’s birthday.  This is a thorough piece of research that touches on many sources that are generally hidden from the lens of history, including practice and personal preferences.  For those interested in the social reception of new technology, the women’s movement, and food history, this volume offers something for them.  In addition, it is an easy read for those who are not academic historians and only have a passing interest in the subject. Read more »

A couple of additional gardening books that I am currently reading …

and

The first book (Heirloom Vegetables: A Home Gardener’s Guide to Finding and Growing Vegetables from the Past) is an ideal beginners book.  About half of the book concerns the reasons to grow heritage vegetables and some of the details about how to find and grow them.  The last half of the book is a small selection of vegetable profiles and resources – including a very good list of seed suppliers and saver networks.  Unfortunately, when compared to the second book (Heirloom Vegetable Gardening: A Master Gardener’s Guide to Planting, Seed Saving, and Cultural History), its profiles and resources show their true limitations.  But, the little Heirloom Vegetables book would make a nice gift for a new gardener or just someone getting into those special plants.  Read more »

Garden is doing well …

And, we are starting to get a regular supply of items … we have gotten a handful of small tomatoes, these two squash, and one large tomato.  But, from all of the fruit on the vines, we are going to have a lot of little tomatoes soon and probably 8-10 large ones!

A couple of weekends ago, Jill and I did some gardening.  We added mulch around the house and planted a handful of plants – 4 tomatoes, 3 squash, some herbs (including two types of basil, in pots below) and a bunch of flowers … including the sunflowers that we grew from seeds.  Here are few photos …

END DATE: Midnight Sunday 13th June 2010

Thinking about moving back home has made me think of the things that I want to be able to do and one of those things is to have a nice little garden to grow some fruit, vegetables, and maybe a handful of flowers.  As I was thinking about my future garden, I have also been thinking about the reasons that I want to grow my own food.

There are a whole bunch of standard reasons to grow your own food, such as:

• To save money.
• To have fresher vegetables.
• To get outdoors into the fresh air.

But, honestly, most of those are not the reasons that I want to garden.  While I enjoy fresh vegetables and love the outdoors, they are not the things that make we want to garden.  Additionally, gardening will not necessarily save a family money on vegetables. Read more »