A Gift from Dan

By Skeeter

It is always fun to read other Garden Blogs although I have not had the time lately to visit many. The spring planting season keeps me busy in my Georgia Garden and not on the computer so much. The Blogging world is full of fun and interesting people with wonderful new ideas. I learn something new every day while blogging! One of those new things I learned was there is such a thing as purple tomatoes! When Dan from the Urban Veggie Garden talked about them, I was intrigued. Dan offered to send me some seeds and just as promised, they arrived in the mail.

I put some of the seeds into small containers and moisten them well with warm water.

Then to the tray they went.

Plastic lid on top and in front of a sunny window in the sun room to sprout.

This is one of two reasons why I don't like to fool with seeds, seedlings and all plants in this house. Sheba (one of the two) was table-side as soon as I placed the tray in that spot. Those cats don't miss much!

I have never really had much luck with starting anything from seeds inside but was keeping my fingers crossed for Good Luck just the same. Oh happy day when two of the seeds sprouted for me!

I tried my luck with more seeds but to no avail. I am saving the last few to place directly into the soil once we get the Veggie Garden tilled.

The Veggie Garden soil remains too soggy to til so for now the tomatoes were transplanted into larger containers.

They did not handle the transaction well and I was worried that I was going to loose them.

But as you can see, one is taking off and doing really great now. The other one is still chugging along and hopefully it will survive the transplant and a second transplant into the ground once it is ready for planting.

I am hoping to sink my teeth into my first purple tomato this summer. And if I do, it is all thanks to blogging and A GIFT FROM DAN, In the Garden...

Again, thanks for this gift Dan. Even if I fail, it has been fun trying my hand at raising a purple tomato from such a tiny seed!

Container Garden

The Saint and I have always had a vegetable garden of sorts pretty much everywhere we have lived. Our favorite was while in Germany with some German friends. We purchased this cute Gartenhaus to store our tools.


Gartenplatz are a wonderful place to teach and learn gardening as well as a great way to build on American relations.

With our first owned house here in Georgia, we were lucky enough to get a bonus of 2.5 acres of land! We could not wait to get our garden started. But we had so many house renovations to complete before we even looked at the yard. Plus we were in a 5 year drought so not a great time to think of planting anything.



It did not take us long to decide that a vegetable garden would not be feasible for us. We are surrounded by beautiful woods but with the woods comes wildlife.

We knew that the deer, squirrels and rabbits would be a battle so we decided to NOT attempt a veggie garden as we wanted the animals to be our friends. Life was good without a garden.

Then happens Tina's "In the Garden" Blog which I started reading from day one! Tina's blog led me to Dave's "Home Garden" blog. All was fine until everyone started talking about vegetable gardens! I was now missing a vegetable garden in my life. There is nothing like growing your owns veggies to spoil the appetite!

The Saint and I talked about it and we decided that after 6 and half years in this house that we would give veggie gardening a try. First thing was to secure everything from the rabbits. We did not want to spend a lot of money in case this turns out to be a battle that we could not win over the wildlife. We cleared an area on the edge of our natural area beside my Flower Garden which gets some sun. This area has had leaves and pine straw on it for some time so I thought it would be really a great fertile place for a garden.



We found some wire fencing high enough to deter the rabbits and hopefully flimsy enough to deter the squirrels. We will deter the deer by hanging Dial Soap around the fence. I believe that patch measured out at 50 square feet.



With spring rains came a soggy mess in our garden patch. We were thinking of going with Plan B and turning our garden in to a Water Garden! I know in time this area will dry out but I feared that would take too much valuable growing season. Again, the Blogs came into play. I recall all the chat about container plantings so I decided to give it a go.

I had to get this all worked out in my mind before doing one thing. A few weeks ago we were burning brush and the trees we recently cut down to extend our woodshed into a combination Mower garage. The tree trunk was too wet for the Saint to split with the ax so I had the idea for him to cut the trunk into smaller pieces with the chainsaw. As he was cutting about 4 inch slices, I could not help but notice how they looked like stepping stones! Ah, my first idea, make stepping stones in the Container Garden to keep the feet dry! So in the patch went my new free wooden stepping stones. I thought I had snapped a picture of my wood stones but did not so you must use your imagination on this one.

From there, the plan was rolling along in my mind. I stopped by a dollar store and picked up plastic containers. I filled them with fresh Miracle Grow soil for Vegetables. As I was moving the stepping blocks around to accommodate the pathway, I found pesky termites under most of them. Now my cheap way out was foiled by Nature. Out went the free wood stones and in came clay stones to match the pathway of our patio.

Weeds were taking over the bare spots and another idea came to mind. I had been wondering what to do with the hay bales from my Fall Display of Scarecrows frolicking on hay bales. I took the hay bales and spread out the hay on the bare ground.

I had to keep three of the non termite infested wood blocks as a higher point of entry by stepping over the fence. I am not sure what to do if they get termites, but we will cross that bridge when we get to it. I may have to ask Dave for advice on the gate to his raised bed fencing.

So far everything we have planted is flourishing. Pepper, Tomato, Squash, Cucumber, Egg Plant, etc. The seed of the Zucchini, Bean and 7 Gourds finally decided to pop up! I put a Peach Pit in the middle of one container in hopes of producing a Peach Tree but I am not going to hold my breath for anything to happen with that.

To the left is a cowhorn pepper. Never heard of it but the Saint just had to have one! To the right is the Gypsy Pepper. Again, never heard of it but the Saint just had to have one of those also! Hope they are not too hot for me to enjoy...









We have a tomato on one of the vines and blooms galore on the other one.


The Cucumber is taking off and will grab the stakes soon.







We have never tried to grow an egg plant before but thought, what the heck. Lets give it a try!

Hopefully we will have plenty of goodies to call this project a success and if so, next year the garden will expand!

So thanks to Tina and Dave, I am exploring the world of a Vegetable Container Garden!