Thursday, August 11, 2011

Nightly ritual

Every night, when supper's been eaten and the dishes have been washed and put away, the kids and I head out back to check up on my our vegetable garden.

Every night, without fail, the three of us hunker down in the dirt and give each plant a good look-see. Is the broccoli plant EVER going to flower? Are there any peppers ready to be picked? Have the tomato plants produced any new fruits?


The kids will water my their plants while I pull out the occasional weed, and we'll all stop and take a whiff of the fragrant basil.


Then we head over to the "pumpkin patch" to see if there are any new baby pumpkins on the way.


My enthusiasm for the garden seems to exceed theirs for the time being, and the kids will invariably wander off and do something else before I'm finished with my examination.


Going out there every day, witnessing the subtle (and sometimes not so subtle!) transformations that occur from day to day, watching Maxime's face light up when he spots another of his cucumbers or Émilie's satisfied look as she eats a green bean right off the vine... it's become one of the best parts of my day. Maybe THE best part.

Heck, even Lori the cat wants to get in on the fun.


Happy gardening, everyone!

7 comments:

Celia said...

The garden looks great!

margaux said...

My husband and I just planted a tomato and strawberry plant and I LOVE going out to check on it everyday - we're getting impatient as the tomatoes are getting bit but none have turned red yet!! It's so exciting :-)

Sinéad said...

I'm interested to see how your broccoli goes. Mine just sprouted into little heads & then flowered before they were edible. Very dissapointing. My pumpkins, however, are doing great! Taking over the garden. Yours look good too, and the photos are brilliant.

kate-the-enabler said...

What a lovely post.
(Say what? Mooooove OVER Soule Mama ;) )
I was privileged to contribute to the garden's wellbeing while you were away. Turns out it's easier to take responsibility for someone else's watering than it is to do my own... (as invited, we DID help ourselves to a cuke. It was heavenly.)

Knit and Purl Mama said...

The garden looks great. LOVE the pumpkin. How many pumpkins do you have? Is the plant taking over the entire garden already? I tried pumpkin my first garden summer - and it took over the garden covering everything else, and gave me ONE pumpkin only. I was sad. But loved that one pumpkin!

Maryse said...

It looks so yummy! That tomato...

Dawn said...

Your garden looks awesome! My youngest, Josiah, loves to look at the garden...and eat things right off the plant!