A Small Family Under Tonight's Full Moon

It's time to give you an update on my Victory Garden Drive "companion planter" team!

Hannah
Meet Hannah. She joins "Team Pattie" from the suburban South East of England. Hannah's email to me made me laugh because I asked her how much gardening experience she had and she started by saying that she only had a little experience with herbs in pots, and then went on to name about ten of them. She said that both her dad and granddad were keen gardeners, and it then struck me as no surprise that she would have ambitious goals for her own garden this year, because as we know, the seeds of gardening are planted in childhood.

Hannah is already composting kitchen scraps and has smothered weeds in a long garden bed. She ordered seeds for tomatoes, peppers, lettuces, squash, and even tomatilloes (simply because she's curious). Welcome to the team, Hannah! And, by the way, I grew tomatilloes once and they spread their arms widely so allow a big space for them--one plant will yield dozens of fruits.

Lissa, who is a die-hard Jane Austen fan (have you watched the Masterpiece Jane Austen movies, Lissa? We have been thoroughly enjoying them--and thinking of you!), will probably be thrilled to follow Hannah's journey in Jane Austen's neck of the woods.

Lissa
Speaking of Lissa, she is buzzing away up in Saratoga Springs, New York (Zone 5), with a garden plan, sprouts for sandwich toppings growing on her counter, and a clementine crate converted into a seed-starting center ready to go by mid-March. Check out her post and see if you, too, don't catch her enthusiasm! And Lissa, I'll send you a couple heirloom Moon and Stars watermelon seeds since you want to try growing a watermelon. There is much to learn from growing a watermelon--in fact, I know of no better way to learn patience.

David
And then there's David, here in Atlanta. David, who had an injury that prevented him from heavy lifting, recruited his sister to help him with the bags of topsoil and manure that helped turn a patch on the side of his driveway into his front-yard vegetable garden, complete with little onions sprouting up around the perimeter. The drama continues, however, as a neighbor dog dug up all his hard work the other night. Stay tuned for the next chapter of David and the Dog!

Liz
Now, swing up an hour and a half northeast of me and you land on Tim and Liz's farm, even though they currently live an hour in the other direction as they build their farmhouse. Every day finds them on the farm, caring for their cows, pigs, chickens, and more--all animals they have never raised before yet which are part of their homestead dream of self-sufficiency since leaving their corporate and teaching jobs and moving down from Boston not long ago.

Liz asked the "locals" when to plant her garden and they told her to start seeds on Good Friday (March 21 this year). I told Liz she would miss the entire spring garden if she did that! Apparently, so many people only think of those summer gardens, and here in north Georgia it is not only easy to have a solid three-season garden (and I am just finishing up my first year with a winter garden as well), but the spring and fall gardens are my favorite because they are not so horrendously hot. The spring garden, in particular, is relatively pest-free (except the neighbor dog, of course, David!) So, Liz now has potatoes, onions, lettuces, spinach, kale, chard, peas, radishes and more going in her new garden.

Rita
And finally, let's welcome Rita. Rita and her husband Bill have homesteading dreams like Tim and Liz, and I'm hoping they find Tim and Liz's journey inspiring. Rita, who grew up in Montana, is about to move from her current home in Hawaii to a 10-acre farm in Missouri, where she and her husband will live off the grid. They plan to have fruit trees, a greenhouse, chickens and goats, and to grow veggies in 4' x 8' boxes. They plan to make their own yogurt and cheese, and they eat mostly raw foods.


And so, we have some interesting stories developing here! I have a map of the world on which I will ask the children at Open Garden to mark the locations of the members of Team Pattie. We'll be researching the geography, history and current events of each place, and reading literature and exploring art from these areas, just as my kids and I have been doing for Adelaide, Australia and Beijing, China ever since our Flat Stanley exchange with Kate and Maggie back in the fall.

The world is a vast and glorious place, and yet when we connect through shared passions such as gardening, we are a small family under tonight's full moon.