A Backyard Illinois Garden

Leaving Ohio for several days, Seth and Serenity went to Illinois to visit my mom and dad and I just had to show you their garden.  This garden isn’t a gazillion flowers but an edible garden and one that I find lovely as well.

My dad, never one to do anything small, planted a garden that was probably almost an acre in size, just for the two of them.  Of course, there was so much produce that mom would not/could not let go to waste that she ended up canning and freezing enough to feed her 3 daughters and their families.  Whenever I can produce (which is not frequently), I always think of mom and marvel that she had the strength to do it.  Amazing lady!

Dad has always loved to garden, so he was in charge of planting, pest maintenance, plowing and of course picking veggies when things got too out of hand.  Always highly productive.

These days they don’t plant as much, alas no fresh produce, but I’m glad mom and dad don’t have to work so hard.  They grow a few veggies for themselves but since I don’t have pictures of that, the tour we will be taking are the pictures that Serenity took of the garden that comes back year after year.

“However many years she lived, Mary always felt that ‘she should never forget that first morning when her garden began to grow’.”

–Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden

“The blacker the berry the sweeter the juice”

“We plant upon the sunny lea,

A shadow for the noontide hour,

A shelter from the summer shower,

When we plant the apple-tree.”

– William Cullen Bryant

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

“Every thought is a seed.  If you plant crab apples, don’t count on harvesting Golden Delicious.”

“Pray how does your asparagus perform?” John Adams, in a letter to his wife Abigail

Are you casting asparagus on my cooking?

A beautiful garden is a work of heart.

Do you plant a vegetable garden every year? If you do, do you ever feel like you’ve learned it all, or do you feel there is always more to learn?