Garden

I picked some cherry tomatoes from our garden today. I call it ‘garden’ even though the tomato plants are grown in pots, and so do most of our other plants. Our home in Santa Cruz is tiny, with no yard space, but a little patio and a pathway that wraps around the house. In some ways, it’s been perfectly fine for us with young children. I can’t even find time to water the plants we have let alone take care of a full blown yard. Someday, we will have more space. But for now, we have created our own little garden that is just as good as any.


Our brother in law, Nickolai, found some great wine barrels for us when we first moved in. He even cut each one in half so that we could use them for bigger plants. I planted a rose called ‘double delight’ in one, a bamboo in another, an olive tree in another, and a lemon tree in the last. That was the beginning of our garden. As time went by, I kept adding more flowers in smaller pots, lettuces here and there. This last summer I was able to grow a whole crop of arugula enough to make many batches of pesto. We also grew a couple cherry tomatoes, basil, lemon cucumber, sweet pepper, parsley, kale, oregano, thyme, sage and rosemary.


The kids enjoyed picking food from the garden this summer. They learned that tomatoes had to turn red or orange before they are ripe. They got to taste the fresh peppery arugula, and fed fresh kale to our bunny Scooter. They helped water the plants and watched them grow. The garden is as much a classroom as a functional place where food grows.


Even though it is fall and most plants are going back to the earth, we do live in temperate California climate. We should be able to grow one more crop of arugula and lettuce before the real rainy season arrives in a couple of months. I remember one year we had a garden full of swiss chard and a cherry tomato that never stopped producing all the way through the winter!