Gardening 101: Part 2

Ok, I am sooooo behind on blog posts. I have been so extremely busy with work and life just gets in the way. I've been meaning to write about Part 2 of my Summer 2012 rewind. Earlier this past summer, I helped my cousin Kathy get her garden up and running. She has a big backyard in Queens and wanted to really grow some veggies this summer. Here is the backstory of me going to her house and planting seedlings and sowing seeds with her.

She was so excited when she saw the seeds start to sprout and so was I! She sent me weekly photos and I loved seeing the progress!

Scallions when they first sprouted.

Then 2 weeks later. How cool do these scallions look?

First signs of lettuce sprouting.

And the lettuce a week later getting bigger! Get ready for lots of salad I told her!

I mentioned to her that she could snip the lettuce leaves and eat them when they are small, like microgreens! They keep growing back! A forever salad!

All summer, she excitedly sent me photos of the plant progress. Like, the start of snow peas.

And the snow peas getting bigger!

And even bigger, and signs of flowering!!

We planted a variety of heirloom tomatoes seedlings that I grew from seed and they were taking off! I was so happy to see that the seedlings were getting larger and stronger!

Every week, I looked forward to getting her photos and garden update. One thing she mentioned to me that she quickly realized was a "chore" was getting up early before work to water the plants! Tell me about it! Next year, maybe I can talk her into a sprinkler system or drip irrigation. :)

More seedling photos.

The pepper seedlings getting larger!

The radishes when they first started sprouting.

The radishes really started to take off too!

It was so fun to see my cousin so excited about gardening, I forgot the feeling of giddiness and joy the first time you start an edible garden. It's so contagious I told her. I think she caught it. The gardening bug. Stay tuned for the results of her labor. The next post will be the harvest photos!

(All photos were taken by my cousin Kathy)