How Does Your Garden Grow...

Along with the started plants that we bought we also got some stuff that was available only in seed and planted those in the garden.  We planted 7 different kinds of seeds.  The seeds that were to pop up the earliest were the radishes, with an expected time of 4 to 7 days.  I fully expected it to take the full week and was already setting myself up for disappointed failure thinking it would be a miracle if this whole garden thing actually panned out.  I was thinking of it as a learning experience, knowing that I could always try again if something failed to grow.

I think I'm the most optimistic pessimist there is.  Or maybe I'm a pessimistic optimist.  Is there anyway to tell?

Saturday I went out to check on everything, it had been 4 days but I wasn't expecting much, then I saw that there was an extra bit of green that hadn't been there the day before.  The radishes were up!  I HAD RADISHES!!!  I almost ran back to the house to tell mom and grab my camera, I was so excited!  Pretty soon everything was popping up, way sooner then it was supposed to.  

The beets showed up the next day.  They should have popped up between 6 to 8 days but decided to show themselves on day five.  They were very cute, starting as little tiny red shoots before opening up their leaves the following day.  I HAD BEETS!!!

Here are some of the Wax Beans on day two of their entrance.  They emerged on Monday along with the Asparagus beans.  And as with all of our seeds they too were overachievers, showing up a couple days before they were expected.  I HAD BEANS!!!  Three different kinds!

 These are the radishes a week after they first came up.  I took this picture before I thinned them out.  The seedlings that I pulled were transplanted to a planter box so that they could continue to grow.  I have to thin out the beets next.

There are flowers on the tomato plants and they have grown quite a bit in the past week.

These are the cucumber and squash plants.  We have to tilt that lattice so that they can climb it and the veggies will hang through for easy picking.  The squash plant in the middle really likes the spot it is in, it's grown a few inches since it was planted.

These are the Asparagus Beans that were started from seed.  The seeds actually came from a bean that mom got from one of her employees.

Most impressive are the last two seeds to sprout.  Our chives (top picture) and the carrots (bottom picture), both of these seeds had a germination time of 14 to 21 days.  With all of our early sprouters I guess I was expecting them to come a few days early, but since they weren't due to show up for 2 or 3 weeks I was very surprised when 7 days after they were planted I spotted little tiny green shoots poking themselves out of the dirt!    I HAD CHIVES!!!  AND CARROTS!!!

I know these are all just seedlings and it's going to take a little while for them to become fruit bearing plants but it is still very exciting to plant something and watch it grow.  Especially when they keep surprising you day after day.  So how does my garden grow?  Like it's on speed!

 - Today I am grateful for a mom that is just as excited about our garden as I am, and a family that is supportive and doesn't make fun of me when I smile and jump up and down all because of a plant -