Today is Julia’s birthday! I planted a bunch of potted flowers in Julia’s garden, her most favorite place in the world. We started the 2500 square foot garden in 2015 as one giant compost pile. In the beginning Julia spent hours every day pulling weeds out. We kept adding compost, manure, fish bone meal, lime, calcium carbonate and much more. We struggled at first and the soil was very compacted.
Julia worked on her garden almost every day for the past 6 years!!! Nowadays we are consistently growing green onions, kale, chard, corn, bokchoi, peppers, eggplants, daikon, carrots, green beans, snow peas, fennel, dill, edamame, culinary herbs and more depending on the season. I’m proud that Julia successfully grew bulbing onions, cauliflower, artichoke, wheat, garbanzo beans, yamaimo, and now we have gobo (burdock) to harvest.
The garden is more than just our outdoor fridge. It’s a space to meditate, relax, reflect on life, make new discoveries and it’s a safe and happy place. I’m very lucky to be married to someone with a super green thumb. We are also very fortunate to grow most of our vegetables and greatly supplement our daily diet.
Here’s to many more happy years of gardening. Thanks Krystle and Barret for the Wednesday night pizza party!!!
Originally posted on 2021-11-17, part of the daily planting journal behind Ha’a Chocolate’s food forest on Hawai’i Island.