Driste

Gardening for dummies

And so it begins.

I'm not a complete gardening dummy..... I mean, I have lots of house plants and some outside plants on our patio. I've done some container gardening. I've grown basil, jalapeno peppers, and assorted annuals from seed. I've grown tomatos and bell peppers from baby plants. I know how to repot, how to mulch, how to fertilize.... but I've always just gone by the bare basics of gardening. Now I'm hoping to research, to really learn secrets and tips, to really dig deeper..... pun totally intended.

I stopped by an Estate Sale off of Johnson today and picked up a nice Ficus Benjamina tree for just $3.00! It's very healthy now, but will probably lose much of its foliage in the upcoming days. Ficus trees are big babies and can be incredibly sensitive to any sort of changes: light, heat, movement, or repotting. I may have to repot it as I think it's a bit root bound, but hopefully I can give it some time to adjust to its new home first so it doesn't shrivel up and die on me.

I took a trip to Pacific Home and Garden store. Those of you SLO folks out there, they're having a house plant sale: $4.99 for 6" house plants, $19.99 for 10". So I bought a few of those. Tomorrow I'll be repotting them all.

When I repot, I'm always scrambling around for rocks or terracotta shards to cover the drainage hole in my pots. But here's a genius idea I stole from My New Favorite Site: Use coffee filters! What a grand idea! Or use styrofoam packing peanuts!

Today I also bought my rubbermaid bin for my homemade composting bin. And I got a bunch of bulbs and tubers: Ranunculus, Anemone, and Watsonia Pyramidata. I'm a little nervous since I've never planted bulbs before and they were a bit pricey.  And since I don't have a "garden" (yet) I have to use containers, and I'm not sure how well the bulbs will do in containers.

I browsed longingly through all the seed packets, but I still have a lot of planning and research to do before I decide what to buy and what I should grow. Plus, I'm pretty far from optimal germination time for most vegetables.

Tomorrow's agenda: Repotting house plants, gathering browns and greens for the compost bin, and readying my homemade compost bin.

sprouting ambitions

                                  photo from http://www.yougrowgirl.com

I am inspired by this site to dip my green toe into the soils of gardening once more. I love digging my hands in dirt and potting soil, and watching my plants flourish, but lately I've been watching them droop as my dedication and enthusiasm for them as wilted. So I will start planning my vegetable container garden over the next few months. Why containers, you ask? I still throw my money away every month (I rent). If I have to up and move (which I haven't had to do for 4 years.... knock on wood), I want to take my beloved plants with me. Besides, this time next year I should have my own brand-spankin-new house (Knock on wood!!!!!) and will want to bring my leafy green friends with me to scorching hot Paso Robles.

I'll be recruiting my hubby to help me build several portable beds for the backyard. He doesn't know this yet. And in the meantime, I'm saving up for a compost bin, selecting my seeds, and reading up on gardening.

On my garden wish list:

This, or this (isn't it cute?), or this for lazy composting*
This, for germinating seeds in the garage. That is, if Tay will sacrifice a little corner of his workbench.
This, for sporting while I toil in the soil.

All that, some wood for the beds, some sand, mulch, potting soil, newspaper, and I should be good to go.

So this is now my gardening blog as well. I may have to move to Typepad or Movable Type so I could categorize all my entries for archiving and ease of use. Just think.... my categories would be as follows:

My Stomach Hurts
My Knee Hurts
I Think I Might Be Preg-o
I Heart Ashtanga
I Heart Wine
I Heart Sushi
I Heart Liberals

Can you think of any others?

*If I choose to save a few bucks, I will be using this article to make my own little compost bin. Come to think of it, maybe I'll get moving on that this weekend....