Green Thumb

It turns out that we have a little gardener on our hands. D had a week off back in May and decided to use some of that time to section off an area of of the backyard to plant some tomatoes and peppers. Nothing fancy. He enlisted LB's help and explained the process to him. He gave LB the task of watering the tomatoes and peppers every day so they would grow. LB loves to have a job and to feel like he is helping so he accepted his task with enthusiasm. 

It's crazy to look back at the pictures from the beginning of the summer and to see how tiny the plants were. We got an insane amount of rain in June so LB didn't have to do too much watering and our little tomato plants turned into unruly giants! The peppers came in first and LB was very excited when D told him he could start picking some. In the picture below he is proudly showing me one of the peppers.

See what I mean about monster tomato plants. We did Roma Tomatoes and Big Boys. D's plan is to use the Romas to make his super yummy salsa. And then I will happily slice up the big boys and eat them with just a little balsamic dressing. 

LB started to get a little impatient with the tomatoes because they were growing like crazy but not turning red. Finally, last week they started to turn and he has probably picked around 25 Romas and 5 Big Boys so far and there are still a ton.

Our little garden is so simple but it's brought a lot of joy to LB. Every morning when we leave the house he says, "Mommy, I have to go check my tomatoes." And he walks straight over to them and will give me a status report about which ones are changing and which ones he thinks are ready. If someone comes to our house he will ask them, "Do you want to come see my garden?" And he happily shows it off. The day D told him there were some tomatoes he could pick you would have thought D had told him that Santa himself was coming to our house. He was SO excited. And so proud too of what he had done. He's learned a lot of lessons from our garden. We've talked about how plants need water and sun to grow, that some of our food comes from the ground and there have been lots of good discussions about patience. He is also much more inclined to try and eat it if he has had a part in the process. We were at a friend's house last week and she has some blackberries in her garden. LB asked if there were some he could pick and she pointed out some that were ready. He picked them and immediately put one in his mouth. He NEVER would have tried a blackberry if I had just bought some from the store. I really hope next year we can expand our garden. I told D I have visions of getting some raised beds and growing a lot more stuff. We live in the city and have a small backyard but I'm optimistic we can make it work. (By that I mean, D will figure it out.) This boy is on board for sure!