Welcome to Gardening 101!

Well, this year we decided to try our hands at a little gardening. It has been a ton of fun figuring it all out.   With the little knowledge I had of gardening from our gardens growing up, Tanner's Biology degree and our neighbor who happens to be getting his masters in plant science (sweet!) we have done pretty well (and learned A LOT!).

Attempt #1:
On our first attempt we were trying to be way too cool and grow the plants straight from the seeds. We planted the seeds in these cute little planter thingies, labeled them with leftover 2nd grade art supplies and diligently watched them sprout for 2 1/2 months on our kitchen table.

 We planted 3 types of Tomatoes along with Basil, Cilantro, and Oregano

Look how proud we were!

Liam loved watchin'

The little sprouts make their debut!

Ok, so, that was February to May. After they sprouted we read you were supposed to "harden" your plants by taking them outside for short amounts of time everyday so you could transfer them to the outside world, but it didn't really say how long you were supposed to "harden" them outside for.

Well, to get right to it we killed them. All our cute little sprouts were dead. We killed them in about 2 hours flat. We were pretty bummed to say the least. We even delayed throwing them away hoping they would come back to life if we waited long enough. But no. They were dead, dead, dead.

Attempt #2
After all that disaster, we finally went to the store and just bought the dang plants. Tanner also made an extra plantar box to join the existing one on our porch (good opportunity to use those power tools).
We planted them and they are thriving! We couldn't be more excited. Every time Tanner goes out to water he comes in and tells me about all the new blossoms he found, how much taller they are and anything else he notices.

Making the new plantar box.
All the neighbors came out to help it was awesome!

Our finished product!

Strawberry plants in our Topsy Turvy planter

Basil

It has been about a month or so and they are doing great! Our plants are HUGE and beginning to blossom and grow fruit. We are so excited. 

We even made some yummy pesto with our fresh basil.

 Today we picked our first strawberry and ate it. It was a little small for two, but it was great!

Well, that is our garden that we are so proud of. We can't wait until we have tomatoes...