About a year ago I heard the motto: "hacer menos, pero mejor" which translates to ~ take on less responsibilities, but do them better. It was exactly the advice I needed to hear so I dropped everything that wasn't essential to survival. I let go of my ambitions to have a manicured patch of vegetables and instead have been focusing on the much more manageable task of tending to a potted garden of greens and herbs in my front yard.
Living in a rural area with very little access to health care I feel that growing herbs for medicine is totally an essential task. So many of the herbs that were scattered throughout this land I brought together just outside my kitchen door where they are on hand at any given moment.
And alongside the established herbs in pots and a few in the ground, I am sowing seeds for new herbs that I would like to establish in the future garden in my future home. For years I have grown echinacea, a much sought after herb that I wrote about in a recent herbal profile for the Herbal Hive community.
Last year my vegetable patch was taken over by flowers ~ sunflowers, zinnias, and cosmos. It was SO beautiful to walk out there and be surrounded by flowers from my homelands, and others that I have collected over the years from dear friends. The only downside was that the vegetable garden was a little walk away (and, of course, didn't actually have any vegetables to speak of). This year I want to see flowers as I go about my work at home & go to and from our building project on bikes.
Some zinnias actually sprouted up on their own which I transplanted into pots and around them I sprinkled more seeds to put in an in-ground flower bed nearby. I am so excited to see the rainbow of colors their flowers will produce in just a month or two and well into fall.
And there is a big achievement to announce! After years of trying & failing, some tulsi basil has germinated. There are 6 plants thus far and hopefully more. And now that I write this I am realizing that I also need to plant some Italian basil too!
In my sprouts garden everything is going well, every day I have a bit to harvest and sow more seeds about twice a week. Here I have mustard greens on the left and beet greens on the right. Those will be trimmed off for some cheese & chicken quesadillas for lunch today.
After all my talk of giving up the vegetable garden, I have gone back on my word just a bit. It is sad for me to give up entirely on anything to do with plants. So, I have formed a compromise. Now that we are building our house mostly on our own, I just don't have the hours per week I used to dedicate to weeding & planting. But, I cannot imagine fall and winter without squash so, alongside the wildflowers that choose to grow there, I will also be planting some beans and squash. Here are the young plants that await their day of transplantation.
Well, that is all for the garden tour. I hope you have enjoyed it! Until next time my gardening friends 👩🏽🌾👩🏻🌾
Hi Calendula!
Did you find out what was the key for successful germinating of the tulsi?
If you can dedicate less hours to your annual veggies you could grow perennial ones. Once they’re established they need less care.
Great idea about the perennial plants! The situation is that I am moving in a year so, for now my perennial plants must live in pots. When I get my own "forever" garden I will definately focus on multi-year plants. Thanks so much!!
It is a very good motto that can help a lot to do things better without taking on too much responsibility because we can do a lot, but nothing at the same time 👀
I hope all your plants germinate satisfactorily, especially that basil hehe 😊