Blue is the new red

Our adventures at the Farmer's Market are going well. When I first announced to the fam that we would be going every Saturday this summer to 1) learn something new about some food product, 2) put a face and a story to the local growers, and 3) experience community as I had read it to supposedly exist at these things (apparently, one has 10x as many conversations at a farmer's market than in a supermarket!) they balked. Really, Mom? Chris smirked.

I have won!

This morning when I announced to the girls that we would be going (Chris is out of town and Aidan at a slumber party) they cheered! Yes, cheered. And then there was the week I was out of town and Chris cheerfully took the kids without me. Yes, I have won.

SO, last week we learned about candles. The girls walked right up to the seller and asked how she made them. Sophie wanted to know how they smelled and Ella wanted to know how she got them into the creative shapes. We also discovered yellow berries! Who knew? We tried them though, and they were too tart for us. But we decided to get blue potatoes to go along with our blueberries and have a blue meal that night.



After boiling for a few minutes, I sauteed them with fresh onion and salt and voila... they were unbelievable!



However, on the home front, the gardening is not so successful. I think I have inner issues to work on. Every book on gardening says you should journal; keep a list of planting, pests, dates, etc. My gardening journals would look like this:

Year one (Turkey): planted rows of seeds of my favorite foods into tilled rocky soil and expected them to grow. They got lots of sun and I sprayed them through the open second floor window b/c the hose could only reach through there. And they DID grow... into a tangled mess of vines that choked each other and died.

Year two (Seattle): joined a coop with a friend to learn how to garden. Helped her plant and prune, weed and harvest, and figured, how hard can it be?

Year three (Seattle): lettuce (oh my gosh I can't possibly eat another salad!), tomatoes (wilting!), sage (what do I cook with sage??), cauliflower and broccoli and zucchini that are seemingly for miniature people, and strawberry plants from the year before (I think we got one bowl of itsy bitsy ones).



The theme here is that I have a romanticized view of what it should be like, but I lack the follow thru, discipline, and desire to work hard to get it. I'm enamored by the concept. I'm even growing to like reading about gardening. But the more I read, the more I realize I don't want to have to do all that. Soil testing, fertilizer, fungi, watering times and amounts, pruning, harvesting, saving seeds, starting seedlings...

I love my local farmers even more! (And I'm a little worried about the chicks given my propensity...)