“I love my garden, and I love working in it.
To potter with green, growing things, watching each day
to see the dear, new sprouts come up,
is like taking a hand in creation, I think.”
to see the dear, new sprouts come up,
is like taking a hand in creation, I think.”
Anne’s House of Dream; L.M. Montgomery
The late July wind is whispering through our green, lush trees – I’m sitting on our porch, a cup of tea on the side table and the sunshine basking the greenery around our home. This little piece of homeland is such a balm to my soul.
God has given me such peace at our little homestead, tucked away on Prince Edward Island. I can’t say it enough- but I am so grateful to be living here.Our family has always loved being outdoors and enjoying the seasons – the summer on the island has been pleasant and moving at a gentle yet steady pace.
Our hard work of planting and sowing in the spring has blossomed into a lovely vegetable (and flower) garden, providing so many beautiful vegetables for our family. It is nearly time to start storing up again for another winter – in the meantime, we are enjoying the fresh beans, peas lettuce, and herbs every day. Soon, we will be harvesting more vegetables and storing them away for the long, cold winter.
This post, therefore, is all garden – so if you find growing vegetables tedious, this post will not be for you. This is for those who love to garden and bring in their own food all summer long.
It has been an absolute pleasure to work in our family vegetable garden. The girls and I really do work well together and, as a group effort, we tend to this garden all summer long.
My precious boys created a lovely fence for me around the garden this year – as last year, the geese ate most of our carrot tops and decimated our lettuce. I was determined to keep the geese out this year – our little twig fence (created by meandering through roadside ditches and little forest groves to find odd broken sticks) has worked wonders and it has kept the geese out, much to my delight.
Can you read the name “Gauthier” here in our lettuce patch? We have been doing this since we first read about George Washington’s father, planting Washington’s name in cabbages in their family vegetable garden.
In fact, all of our vegetable garden is planned and inspired around “The General’s Garden” – as he did, indeed, have a true love for growing things. Out of our vegetables are planted in rooms – such as the carrot room, the beet room, etc. – and then bordered with flowers that will bloom and encourage pollination amongst the bees. It creates a lovely, fresh atmosphere for gardening – and makes weeding and watering all the more wonderful.
We hand water our garden, using the spring fed pond water, which is located near our vegetable garden. My husband set up this water cistern for us – we simply dip our watering cans in and water each row with the fresh, warm water. It is the best watering system we have had so far in our gardening years. I am extremely grateful for a large supply of good water. This idea is also modelled after George Washington’s garden – although his style of a cistern was ground fed and much more sophisticated.
We always make sure to plant a Sunflower Hallway. 🙂
The boys even made a little gate the end of the garden, which leads to the pond area. 
Lariah, our youngest helper, finds the garden enchanting and is always eager to join us in the morning, weeding, watering or just picking vegetables.
I’m sure I’ll be updating this blog as the garden progresses – we have already begun canning the beans. This week, we will begin pickling some of our vegetables. Keep pressing on, ladies – all your hard work is worth it!
by Gigi
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