Love the garden pictures. Mine doesn't look so hot right now, either.

I used to be a late day water-er... and my friend who is much more smart than I told me that watering at night is bad for your plants. She liked it to being warm and cozy under the blankets in your bed, and having someone come dump cold water on your head. I guess plants need to process cold water and are better at doing that early on. So now I stand out there in the am before work with my coffee and my house and my jammies and to hell with the neighbors. My plants are doing lovely, although in NH we have gotten the summer-o-rain and I haven't watered in a long time.

I inherited my parents' garden (read "very large orchard with a lot of trees and plants and flowers") and it is quite the handful. I think they moved away just so they wouldn't have to take care of all the plants! I wish I could have a manageable edible front lawn...

I am using the redneck drip irrigation system I think I read about here -- fill gallon milk jug with water, make holes with a thumbtack, and the water comes out slow and sinks into the dirt deeply.
Not in the front yard, though...

A garden is a redneck thing? Huh. News to me. I like veggie gardens, although I grow mostly herbs in pots. Landlords don't like you digging up the yard for veggies.

I have a hard time remembering to water the hanging plants and am completely lazy about it. glad I don't have a yard, or things would really look dire!
Have a great weekend!

Most of our yard is covered with trees so we get no grass. I've been working on a large island filled with hostas, shrubs, liriope, ferns and Japanese maples. Once the plants take over (come on plants, start taking over) it should be very low maintenance and much prettier than plain grass.

Beth, it's not the same here. It gets hot VERY early in the day in the valley and if you water too much in the morning the roots can cook. That is what I have been told time and time again. It depends on your climate, I suppose!

Laurie, tell your friend to check out Victory gardens and then show the information to his wife. Backyard, side yard, front yard gardens were very necessary during WW2 and supplied people with fresh vegetables during a time when food was expensive.

We have a large side garden with more than 20 different vegetables & herbs growing in their own little sections. The hubby even had to try growing corn, with mixed results so far. We're in the suburbs of Pittsburgh, PA and two of our closest neighbors also have side gardens; all fenced-in, all daily watered and daily sort of weeded.

There are more of us out here than people think. Now if I could just figure out canning!

In my ideal home there is very little grass - just enough for the dogs to run on & the rest is all "natural" - perennials, some veggies, maybe native grasses.... Of course this kind of yard isn't hip in the city so I will have to move far away where I may not be able to see my neighbors house from mine. There will be a lot of water nearby (LAKE!) and weeding will be optional.

Like the Ryan Shupe song says - - Dream Big!

when we bought our house, the first thing we did was tear out all of the lawn, including the strip next to the street. instead, we planted ornamental grass, bananas, a palm tree, lots of annuals etc. other than a little cleaning out at the end of year, it maintains itself.

although we did see a crazy guy punching out the banana, i guess because it was overhanging the sidewalk. another time, one of the leaves got tagged.

the rest of the yard is veg, flowers, herbs, perennials and a couple of trees. we do minimal upkeep, mulch deeply for moisture retention and eat the spoils of our efforts.

no mowing, no fertilizing (other than with chicken poops!) and very low maintenance. i swear, the guys who come every week to do lawn stuff next door are working harder at it than we are.

I hear overwatering cats makes them blurry :P

This is our second year in our house and my husband put in a garden in the entire side yard. He also put in strawberries across the front of the house - and pepper plants - and cucumbers in a sort of obelist kind of trellis so they can climb. I added some herbs and nasturtiums (edible flowers, but we haven't) and onions. It's kinda fun - our neighbors are nice about it, but probably talk about the crazy people in the yellow house.

He wants to do more next year - which will be ok if he doesn't have to be gone every other weekend for work so he can stay home and weed!

Even blurry cats are very very cute.

I have a huge veggie garden on my side lawn (I'm on a corner, so it faces a street) and flowers/herbs in my front lawn. But then, so do so many people in Portland. My goal is to remove most of the grass eventually and replace with edible and/or pretty things.

California Native gardens are huge in my neighborhood. There are a couple of "master" (what does that mean?) gardeners with drought tolerant native gardens for inspiration. So far... I've ripped up the little patches of grass in front that I killed anyway and went more native. The back... still has grass for the dog. :-)

I would have a garden in the front, if not veggies then flowers and shrubs. Things that take less care and water but look great and bloom. I'm in So Cal now, on the other side of the valley from you so its hot here too, my veggies did terrible this year. But in a little over a year we are going to move to Bellingham Washington which is colder and wetter I'm looking forward to having great flowering plants there!

I don't see anything odd or "redneck" about having a garden in your backyard. I can't imagine having a garden that took up my whole yard though; I would have to plant corn and wheat or something!

Yup, my garden is in my front yard. Gets the most sun out there and all I have to do, to add cherry tomatoes to my lunch, is walk out of the front door. Lovely. Not sure if the neighbours love it, but hey.

@Sarah,

Master Gardeners are folks who have taken a series of classes offered by their local County Extension service (at very minimal cost) and then put in community service hours to pay for their excellent education.

Even if you cannot have a garden, you can grow herbs in bowls (oregano is practically indestructible). Makes you feel very gardenery!

Watering cats will produce broccoli, I hear.

I think that a garden in the backyard is a very normal thing to do.

But then, I am a redneck. So take from that what you will.

I have a tiny vegetable garden in my backyard and one zucchini plant and one tomato plant in my front flower garden. The zucchini is not happy there, but the tomato plant does have a few very small (still very green) tomatos on it. I wonder if they'll turn red before frost! I don't know about turning an entire lawn into a veggie garden. I think mowing is easier than weeding!

Here in New England a lot of people are doing the heavily mulched garden instead of lawns. If you look well, there are a few tomato towers ;-)

Gardening is "redneck"? That's a new one. Unless what she means is "I'm embarrassed to let the neighbors see you working in the yard."

My grandparents grew up during the Great Depression and lived through WWII, and they ALWAYS had a garden. Always. Why spend a couple bucks a lbs for mushy pink tomatoes when you can walk right out the door and pick a fresh, ripe one anytime you want for the cost of the seedlings and a little sweat equity? Home grown organic produce sounds very California to me.

I often kill house plants by forgetting to water them. It's much harder to forget the cat. He bites.

I have a friend who plants pumpkins every year in rows along his front walk. Why? To decorate for Halloween! It's a lovely effect and then he gets to have pumpkin pie and bread all through November.

Thanks for the links on the no-lawn front yard. This is our plan for the next house (we are renting with a landlord who employs a landscaping crew that knows only how to mow, mow, mow).

I would be willing to do an herb garden in the front in lieu of a lawn. Actually I'd prefer to have just about anything in front instead of a lawn.

Back yard gardens are normal. I wish I had grass - what I have is mostly some kind of vine.

I think you may have some kind of squash rather than a pumpkin. I don't think gourds grow that big, so it's probably edible anyway.

I'm with a lot of folks on here....pretty soon I will have very minimal grassy areas. I plan on doing mostly drought-resistant plants, native grasses and the like. So much better for the environment than plain ol' grass!

I couldn't do a garden in my front yard even if I wanted to - I live in a "planned development" and our bylaws are ridiculous. No clotheslines either. We actually have people who have no lives, and they walk around the development, looking for infractions. Then they send nastygrams and then they fine you.

I do have a backyard garden, but it doesn't look very nice - my tomato plants keep falling over. So I probably wouldn't want it in my front yard anyway...

We live in a rural area and have way, way too much front yard, but at least we don't put any chemicals on it. I would LOVE to turn it into an organic field of, well, everything. Someday, right?
I do have a vegetable garden and adore it to little bits. We do have to fence to keep the deer from enjoying it, too.

does the landlord not realize how much money he'd save on landscapers if there was no landscaping to be done? what a maroon!

I come from a long line of farmers and gardners. My mom can get just about anything to grow and is one of those amazingly annoying people who can point to any type of plant and tell you that it's a "whateverfoliensis blah blah." Recently I was at her house and a neighbor came over with a mostly dead (all brown with ONE green leaf left on it) orchid and asked if she could save it. Two weeks later it looks like it was just delivered fresh from the flower shop.

I, of course, have managed to not inherit the gardening gene. I can kill plants by merely walking near them. I am known as the "black thumb" of the family.

But, if I DID have a green thumb, I wouldn't plant an edible garden in the FRONT yard as I think it would attract rude people who think they can just walk through your yard and take stuff without asking - and trample everything while they do it.

Back yard is cool, though.

Although, come to think of it, we had a peach tree in our back yard when I was growing up and people would hop the fence all the time and help themselves to peaches. While we didn't mind sharing (that tree produced A LOT of peaches - we made pies and jam and bags of frozen peaches and still had more fruit), it was the taking without asking and violating of personal space that was an issue.

Whew! That ought to fill my comment requirements for the next month so I will shut up now.

KJ

Our backyard is very shady and I've had little luck with vegetables back there. I'm contemplating planting some in the front, although I'm pretty sure my husband is going to think it's weird. He had a hard time with the clothesline--thought it looked bad, like we can't afford a dryer or something. Anyway, I'm thinking of maybe just sneaking a few things out there and claiming the wind blew the seeds or something.

It's a lot easier to remember to water and feed the cute little furballs. They are a lot more vocal about food and drink (and the lack thereof) than any plant I've ever seen or killed (my thumb is black, but I try anyway).

I could see ripping out the lawn and having just vegetables.
But then again, I can also see myself as the 80 year old floppy hat lady with 16 cats.
If only they would eat the veggies, it would be a perfect scenario!

Love the Charlie Brown Pumpkin!!! You should be proud of yourself!!!

I would totally replace my front lawn with a vegetable garden. Gardens are useful and yummy! Grass...not so yummy. I love the idea of everyone taking responsbility for growing some of their own food...I'm no economist, but it seems that if we grew some of our own food it would decrease the demand for the crappy fruits and veggies they offer us at the grocery stores, and maybe that would decrease prices and/or increase quality. I dunno. It's a nice thought. =)

My front yard is all garden. I have my eyes on the patch of lawn out back (which is surrounded by edibles right now) but the children claim they want to "play." I think there are some pictures of the front on my blog. We've got a killer volunteer pumpkin out there too. Passing strangers comment a lot about it.

No kidding, though, it does take some time. Probably less than you would think, but it does take some. Southern CA is a great place to garden, but water is the issue, so think about grey systems and lots of mulch.

I know I'm a geek but would you mind translating that tiny bit of latin?

I read your blog every day before I start work. It gives me a lift. Plus I got (and read) your book. Well done!

You're my inspiration Laurie!

How weird. I have a weird yellow thing growing in my pumpkin patch too. I wrote about it in my blog this week. Don't feel too bad about your neglected garden. I'm a stay-at-home mom of one child, my garden is only about 20x40 feet and I still can't keep up with it. What's keeping you in the high-rent, high stress district anyway? Maybe you should move east where the cost of living and stress level is lower.

I suggest sneaky gardening. Start by planting a few things at the edges of the lawn that look like ornamentals, but aren't. Consider that lovely variety of basil with the burgundy leaves, or some of the more attractive kale planes, or handsome peppers. Then feign ignorance: You mean you can eat those? I thought they were just for show! Wow! Slowly take over the stupid lawn.

In my neighborhood, hardly anyone has lawn in the front. Mostly flowers, only a few of which are edible. But I don't think anyone would be shocked if some edibles sneaked in. Consider planting some pretty flowers, too - the edibles will be less obvious that way. Oh, and at least in the Northeast, a lot of berry plants are very pretty. Don't know what grows in California, but a few fruit trees would be nice.

We are slowly turning our front and back yards to California native plant gardens. We periodically take out some grass, and replace it with native plants and mulch. It might take a year to finish it, but this way it isn't too much work at once. The native plants thrive on bad soil and minimal water, low maintenance. We thought the neighbors would be opposed, since the landscaping here in south-central is just lawn with the occasional little flower bed. But several neighbors have come over to praise and admire it. We are all tired of the high water bills. The Theodore Payne Foundation for wildflowers and native plants in Sun Valley has the best selection of seeds and plants - summer hours are Thurs-Sat. http://www.theodorepayne.org/

A pumpkin! Lucky.

The season here in the Canadian Foothills is too cold and short most years for pumpkins (and eggplant, peppers, ripe tomatoes, etc). A short growing season is not so bad. 3 and a half months of growing things, then just as things get out of hand and become a jungle-like chaos, a killer frost deals with it all. Nothing to do until next spring except look at seed catalogues.

Redneck? wow. Even the most motel-inspired-rubber-tire-planter-red-and-white-petunia garden (with or without white painted rocks) is humming with profound beauty and healing power. My garden, a dill and poppy filled patch bursting with everything, is sustaining me in a way that I couldn't have imagined. My mom, who is dealing with late stage cancer, taught me to garden. This year's garden, mostly untended, is everything. A place for meditation, peace, grieving, inspiration. Simple things like fresh picked green beans, a giant scarlet dahlia, new potatoes, a handful of lavender provide solace and a bit of joy for mom (and everyone else) like nothing else. The garden is also visited daily by three does and five fawns, and much other wildlife.

Thanks for blogging about growing and gardening.

Cheers.

P.S I can send lots of Zucchini (dark green ones, yellow ones, almost white ones, crookneck ones, bumpy ones). I think U.S customs would not appreciate it, and a cross border incident, likely with military consequences would be bad.

BTW, I recently added your blog to my reader. I enjoy your writing and look forward to reading your blog posts.

I have a dedicated area in my backyard for a veggie garden, and then have various veggie and herb plants stuck here and there amongst ornamental plants like rosebushes and perennials. It's a messy but pretty look. In this way, I don't have to turn my front yard into an "edible lawn" but the front yard IS producing herbs, tomatoes, lemons and cucumbers.

By the way, you scared me off planting too many zucchini, so I planted only one plant this year, and have only had about five small zucchini. My husband is glad, but I actually like zucchini (shredded, salted, sauteed in olive oil with garlic is my favorite.)

The only possible thing you could plant that would be "redneck" would be a still. It's my understanding that proper etiquette for such a garden involves using a shotgun on the folks who then help themselves to the produce without asking.

Seriously, people are trespassing into other people's properties to steal their fruit and vegetables? I'm speechless.

Why should I be surprised? They're probably relatives of people who were stealing gas in the 70s.

Oh! I meant to add, pretty AND edible plants: Nasturtiums and scarlet runner beans. They are gorgeous in combination too.

Why, I thought it was only our cats that reminded us loudly and painfully to feed and water them!
My daughter's dream is to have a drought tolerant front yard w/native plants and a garden in the back. She inherited the gardening gene from her dear sainted grandpa. My daddie always had something growing, even if it was just strawberries in a pot, or a couple of tomato plants in the side yard.
He passed away 2 years ago today, and growing something, even a pot of mint, keeps him close.
Tell someone important to you that you love them today, who knows if you will get the chance again.

BTW, Bob is still handsome even when he's blurry!

I never did get the whole grass thing. All that effort and $$$ spent on something that's basically useless. I'd put a garden in front, except it's 1/4 acre and that's just too big! I do have green beans in the flower bed, tho' and they're doing great. The flowers croaked weeks ago. No green thumb here. I wonder if your landlord would go for thyme if you pointed out that it needs less water than gress. Something to keep in mind for when you're a homeowner.

There's a great Britcom available on DVD now called Good Neighbors that was filmed in the 70s. It's about a suburban couple, Tom and Barbara Good, who decide to become self-sufficient. Tom quits his job at an ad agency, and they turn their front and back garden into a mini farm, and keep pigs (Pinky and Perky), chickens (the cockerel is called Lenin), and a goat (Geraldine), much to the chagrin of their somewhat snobby neighbors. It's fun and cute to watch, and their lifestyle is also on my "someday" list.

I love your garden! If it weren't for our toddler, I'd scrap the lawn and grow something useful. But it's nice to have a patch of grass for her to run around on. I've planted basil, mint, and rosemary in the front beds, though, and they're awesome. I'm way behind you--I just did peppers in pots this year, but next year, I have plans for tomatoes, too, and zucchini. And the way our sun exposure is, it'll go in front. Our quirky little town is fine with that, though--lots of people here do that kind of thing.

Sure, I'd have a garden in the front yard. Not much grass out there anyway...our "soil" is mostly sand, so I'm not sure what would grow (hops maybe? anthills?). I do have a collection of mostly alive herbs in containers right where everyone can see them, and I've been known to come out and water them in my pajamas. I own the place! I do what I please! Out back I don't even bother with the PJ's if it's hot; luckily the cats don't care to sit on bare skin. Saves on Band-aids.

My kitties are blurry these days, too--busy kicking bird butt and bringing me lovely dead moles. By now I could have a row of heads on the wall by the food dish if I knew taxidermy!

Have a great weekend! (Mine will consist of a little plumbing, a lot of beer, and the scarf I started this morning. And the hat I started last week. And maybe my winter scarf, which is half-finished, and the baby hat I'm knitting for my boss...)

Don't worry about the odd color of your wonderful pumpkin. Summer squash, like zucchini, are tender and edible from the get-go and stay their intended color from the beginning. Winter squash, such as your pumpkin, are meant to be eaten after a longer growing period, in which they develop a hard shell and their colors change and develop into their winter-keeper glory. So your pumpkin will continue in its own mellow way until the cool weather of Fall encourages it to put on its fancy colors. Or not. Occasionally the first cold snap just brings everything to a halt. But it's still a joyful experience watching your little green babies change every day.

The world will always need food. I just don't understand how our neighbors can prevent us from growing vegetables; can't they see how twisted their reasoning is? A house and its lawn is not worth more than the humans it shelters. Amen to Victory Gardens, which fed more than half the US during WWII.

Our neighborhood has rules about the yards, but they aren't too fussy. The only folks that catch the ocassional request to neaten up are the ones who have planted "butterfly" gardens, which I love but do tend to look shaggy and overgrown when thriving. I do know I'd have a better chance to remember to water if I passed the plants on the way out every morning.

I live next to (on both sides!) the gardeners who have those "ornamental" shrubs (i.e. funny shaped and expensive) next to their homes. One neighbor actually crawls around on his hands and knees on his lawn pulling out all those "noncomformist weeds" that sneak in. It's scary. But it also makes me feel bad. I don't fit in. My yard is covered with wild growing morning glory vines and the front lawn is green... that's all I will say. The brick walkway keeps sprouting grasses. It just takes too much work and I refuse to crawl around pulling out offenders. So what is my point? It's hard to be a noncomformist in suburbia (long island in this case). But I'd love to be.

My concern about a front yard edible garden would be other folks helping themselves to the bounty. Also, I like to have my food plants in the back so if I'm cooking in my robe and suddenly think "ooh, I should use one of the tomatos or some of that basil!" I can run out and grab it without being seen.

I never knew how much people cared about lawns until my husband and I moved to our current (and first) house in a modest residential neighborhood. Right now, my front lawn is perfect. Completely dry--no mowing needed! (The plan is to recondition the soil and then landscape with something more interesting than plain grass). We always have lots of bees and butterflies in our yard because we don't kill off the dandelions (they like the flowers).

Anyway, your front yard. Lawn is very high maintenance but I don't think your landlord will agree to taking it out. You might convince him to add a few fruit trees, strategically located to provide shade as well as fruit. Not only would the trees look nice, you'd get a harvest (can you imagine having all the avocados you could eat?), as well as shading the house, thus adding it to its "curb appeal", lowing utility costs, yadda yadda.

Good luck!

Love the Bob photos! (actually, I love all your cat photos but Bob is my favorite model.)

My father-in-law gave up his backyard garden because, like you, he didn't have enough time to tend to it. Instead, he planted his garden behind the office in our construction yard. Now he tends to it whenever he gets a free moment.

I was just having the edible lawn conversation with my kids over dinner last night. We don't think the landlord would like it either, but it would be soooo much better than mowing. We even schemed about what we would grow!

We did rent a small garden this year, and even though I thought I would be drowning in zukes I haven't grown a single one. Something was eating my flowers and something else burrowed into the main stem. :-(

I think this is a very Freudian typo:
"On the other side of the ***yarn*** my peppers have made a comeback". Perhaps you want to be knitting instead? Or planting your favorite skeins?

I admire you for the growing of things. I have only succeeded in producing a really healthy batch of crab-grass.

Happy weekend! Thanks for all of your great posts. I look forward to them!

You bet your bippy I'd replace my front lawn with a garden...but my front lawn is shrubs and rock (I live in the desert). I would also replace my back lawn with a garden and offer this as an option every time my husband starts cursing about what a pain in the butt it is to keep the grass looking good (mowing, edging, adjusting sprinklers, pulling weeds). I tell him, lets just make a path or two and plant veggies every where else. Unfortunately, that usually makes him OK with the lawn again. We have a decent garden in a large planter out back, but I would replace the lawn in a heartbeat. If you do it right it doesn't have to be ugly (even if you get strange pumpkins).

I love the idea of getting rid of grass -- our house has pretty half-assed, weedy grass that looks sad year-round. I live in Portland, where it's dandelion & clover season from March until August, and I'm totally sick of spending a lot of my (limited) free time trying to pull those suckers out by the roots. (Chemical herbicides are pretty socially unacceptable around here, though I'm considering getting just a tiny bit of Round-up for the non-fruiting blackberry vines that have creeped over from my neighbor's yard and literally grow five feet a week.) And then there's the hassle of finding people from Craigslist to come mow the thing (I'm hesitant to invest in a mower since I'm imaging grass-free future.)

Anyway, my ideal yard is like a cross between a classic Japanese garden and a victory garden ... lots of twisting pathways and shady spots and outdoor chairs and interesting plants surrounded by pretty rocks, with no places for weeds to even sprout! Along with three or four raised beds for veggies, and a picnic table with an umbrella, and the charcoal grill, and a little place for my kid to play or sit and draw. (We live adjacent to a park where he can kick balls around, so I don't feel too guilty about removing grass from our yard.)

Now I just need to find the time & money to do this, and to hire some actual experts to help. In the meantime, I'm off to pull a few more dandelions & chop back the thorny invasive vines ...

just remember, even a "garden lawn" will require weeding, trimming, cutting, watering, etc etc, just like grass. I would think, going by my own experience with my family and HUGE yearly vegetable gardens, that they require much more care than just mowing the lawn. You're right, stick with what you have until you have hours upon hours upon hours of time to devote to it.

Wow! Your thumb is very green!

Hey- have you seen the Earth boxes? They are like a big window box on casters, they have a water trough in the bottom to keep the dirt moist for days (maybe less in your climate). I have gotten a zillion cucumbers out of just one box and it looks like at least 50 lbs of tomatoes out of another awaiting some sun to ripen them. All this on my desk. They don't dry out like raised beds. A little pricey upfront- but they can be used year over year. Google Earth Box.

We have recently discussed the possibility of a front-yard garden. My only concern is that we are so close to the street that all the junkies would steal our veggies. Other than that, I'm all for it. But I'm generally pretty anti-lawn, so any alternative looks better to me.

If my plants complained the way my cat did, I'd have the nicest garden on the block.

For the last two years, my SO and I have converted the front lawn to a flower, herb and veggie garden. It's organized chaos with pots of tomato plants, radish and beets mixed in with the nasturtium. There is no rhyme or reason to how we planted anything. It was a "Look! There's space. Plant some seeds!" approach.

I'm reading _The Urban Homestead_ at the moment, and I don't think digging up the lawn to start a vegetable garden is such a bad idea....but then, one would have to deal with (well, in certain types of neighborhoods, anyway!) the neighbors' delicate sensibilities!

When we bought our own place in Oz, guess what we did? We pulled out most of the old lady plants in the front yard and replanted with roses and Oz native plants. We reduced the grass to a pathetic little patch (it remains only because we didn't have time to replant it before moving to the US). The back yard is become a vegie garden and orchard. We will put some edible plants in the front too. We live in "wogsville" where Italians and Greeks plant out everything that is not under concrete with edible plants.
Americans seem very very attached to their lawns. Billions of dollars are spent each year on getting lawns perfect. Some HOAs do not allow people to replant with garden beds - must be green green grass! Amazes us cos we come from a place where we are not allowed to water grass. Lawns are only for the rich.

Laurie, I am not sure about a garden in the front yard...wouldn't your neighbors and passersby get jealous of all your good looking veggies and pluck 'em right off their vines?? At least if it's in the backyard, it's somewhat hidden and you can enjoy the fruits (and veggies) of your labor all by yourself. And having your own garden is not redneck, at least to me (and I am a native New Englander and we can be snobby at times...yeah, shocker, hm?....) Besides, have you seen the prices of produce at the market lately???? YIKES! Smooches to blurry Bob - he is gorgeous no matter what!

We turned our front lawn into a garden...it had gotten overrun with morning glories, and there was nothing we could do as we will also not use chemicals on the lawn. We covered the lawn with cardboard, landscaping fabric and mulch for TWO YEARS and now we have a beautiful garden with all native plants (I think!) in it. We love it. There's a pic on my blog right now...my DH just built a beautiful little arbor for it.

We apparently have a very edible garden. The chipmunks ate the cherry tomatoes (even the green ones), the bunnies ate all the bean plants and carrot tops, and the deer are munching the hostas to death. The only thing left are the hot peppers, which are hanging on by a thread. I live in suburban tract housing close in to the DC. I guess I should feel lucky to have the wildlife, but I wish the coyotes would take care of some of it! (yup, we even have coyotes in Maryland - who'da thought?)

When we get a house, I am totally up for not having a "lawn" I'll have a garden of vegetables or wildflowers or kudzu, but anything not to have to water all the time and tend too much. Both Hubby and I are too busy for a lawn. Plus, it's more eco-friendly to have a garden, not to mention economical for your grocery bill!

Laurie, got your book and LOVED it. As for your lumpkin, didn't you mention that it was supposed to get huge? If so, then it may not turn as orange as you would like, and the lumps and bumps are kinda normal for the giant pumpkins. I really enjoy your blog and all the pics of the cats.
P.S. I have fallen off the "don't buy any unnessary stuff", today, but the candle was so pretty and cheap and smells sooooooo good, anyway I am back on the wagon. Thanks again for your blog

great pic of a blurry Bob. :)
Have a great weekend

You might be a redneck if . . . you grow vegetables? I don't get it.

We have a garden in our back yard and next year my boyfriend says he's using the entire right side of the yard for the garden. The front yard isn't big enough for him!

Have a great weekend, CAP!

It is sad how redneck has taken on such a negative connotation. One theory behind the word comes from the idea that people actually used to work outside in the fields and gardens, looking down at their work, causing a tanned neck--I love my peppers and tomatoes--beets and "wild" black raspberries.

By the way--I am one VERY proud redneck--college degree and nice cushy office job included.

I definitely would have a garden if I could. I doubt I'll ever own a house or have the time. I did have a container garden with all sorts of tasty things when I had less work responsibilities, but I know I couldn't maintain one now.

I've always wondered why people don't use the land around them for food. I know we don't really have a food shortage here in the states, but flowers and grass all over the place always seemed like such a waste!

I would totally have a garden in my yard, but I'm not so much with the reliable - I can water every day for about three days, and then I forget. For, like, ten weeks.

I'm going to try again, though it'll have to be a container garden. We're moving to the Netherlands, and the Dutch have apparently solved the whole embuggerance of lawn-maintenance: they just pave the yard. I'm skeptical about this solution, but Mr. Husband is all, "yesss! No more mowing!"

Wanna see one kick-butt edible lawn?
http://urbanhomestead.org/journal/

Hope this isn't a repeat... but I didn't have the stamina to read through the previous 81 comments! Holy Croley, girl... lol.

Hi Laurie!

I can't remember if I've told you this or not-I know I've meant to, but I don't know if I've ever been successful or not, so if this is a repeat, sorry! A couple months ago I blogged about a book called Backyard Giants: The Passionate, Heartbreaking, and Glorious Quest to Grow the Biggest Pumpkin Ever. I loved it, and now every time I read about your pumpkins, I think about it. They do talk about how some of the giant pumpkins tend not to be orange, and not all are meant to be eaten, so be careful before you go trying to make a yummy pumpkin pie out of anything! Anyway, I think you would enjoy this book since you could sort of relate, being a proud pumpkin grower yourself!

Has Bob been drinking? Is that why he's so blurry?

I'll bet if the plants stood on your face and meowed every morning you'd remember to feed and water them too. Cats have that self-preservation thing down cold, don't they?

Your pumpkin looks like a Vif d'temps or French Cinderella type pumpkin. I grow them and they can be pale or deep orange.

If you don't grow a vegetable garden around here (the great midwest) people think you are just plain lazy.

Good for you for not accepting chemicals on the lawn. Have you seen those cute little plants at the nursery called "Stepables"? They are a range of sweet little plants that can actually be stepped on - ie that alternative to lawn you're looking for. They are very pretty... maybe you could replace just a *tiny* bit of lawn with them. Or border the beds with them? Just a thought.

http://jerseygirlgenius.typepad.com/

I live in a high-rise and garden on my balcony. I can grow enough tomatoes and peppers to keep me supplied all summer. I do miss having a yard, gardening kept me sane. If I did, I would SO have plants (as opposed to grass) all over - grass is too high maintenance...

Laurie:

In my neighborhood in Downtown San Jose (the 10th largest city in the US) there are a number of homes where gardens are planted in the front yard. My next door neighbor grew his own food in his garden and lived on his very small social security check that was used to purchase meat, and other staples that he would pick-up from the grocery store on his daily bicycle rides throughout the neighborhood. He lived this way until his untimely death a few years ago and he was in his late '80s. I'm convinced that growing his own food ensured that he lived a healthier life and therefore lived longer than most men his generation. In addition, it was so nice to come home from a busy day at work to find some freshly harvested items waiting on my front porch; a gift from Mr. Jimmy.

Diane

Yeah, I don't think I would ever turn a FRONT lawn in to a garden, but the side or back yard... yeah! But then again, I live in an area where grass just grows, without extra water or chemicals or anything. It just has to get cut.

Plus I tend to kill plants. I can follow the exact same routine as someone else, and their plants will thrive and mine will die.

Every time.

I don't know if I'd put a garden in. I tried putting in some flowers when I first moved in and had ideas about veggies in the back but the flowers didn't do too well (it's very soggy in the front and there was less light than there is now). And I tend to kill plants anyway.

I think you would really enjoy Michael Pollan's book Second Nature; he has some interesting background on the Great American Lawn and how our views of nature in this country have developed over time.

The difference between cats and plants....

The FuzzBoy doesn't give me time to forget to feed and water the cats! He starts as soon as I sit up in bed in the morning - whine, nag, nag, whine (often sounding like a goat, sheep, rusty hinge, or air raid siren!).

This is probably why I do so much better with cats than with plants, which just quietly turn brown and fall apart when I forget to water them. If the cats don't eat them first.

We just put in a bid (a long-shot bid--but hey, it's a bid!) on a house today, and I can't WAIT to replace the trees in front with fruit trees and the straggly parkway grass with a Mediterranean herb garden!
I think that the trick to a food-producing front yard is research and sneakiness. No one looks twice at beds of rosemary or lavender these days...and hey, what's that amusing feathery plant around that rose bush? (No one will KNOW it's carrots if you don't tell!). And grape-variety tomatoes look awesome in hanging baskets with a few orange nasturtium and yellow marigolds planted in with it.
As long as it's pretty and the veggies are woven in among more conventional plants, I don't think anyone's going to say a thing.

I'm in the OC and, apparantly, veg gardens are rare here where the real estate is dear. My side yard is the veg area, which I see out my kitchen window. It has its ugly times. Right now the tomatoes (9) are turning red and the plants brown, the eggplant (3) is about done, and the peppers and chiles (18) are just turning red, but I love to look at all its stages.
My front yard has very little grass. It's mostly a low-growing rosemary. When people walk by, they often run their hands over to get the aroma, or pinch a bit off. Neighbors are welcome to cut sprigs for their kitchens, but I tell them to take it from the back or the sides, because the front by the sidewalk is where people walk their dogs and, well, you know.

I forgot to say how cute Bob is today. It's that purity of heart that blurs the picture.

If I lived in a city/suburban type setting, I would totally be converting whatever space I could into a vegetable garden in an urban guerilla type of way. I don't really understand the sanctity of the American Lawn, and it drives me nuts when I see expanses of green that exist just to be mowed and have chemicals dumped on them. To what purpose?

I think your pumpkin will look awesome on your porch on Halloween. Very imperfectly scary.

Yeah for pumpkins! We had a volunteer plant (we left our pumpkins from last year out over winter for the critters to eat) in one of our flower beds, so we moved it to our vegetable garden (no, they are not rednecky!) The little plant didn't look to happy at first, but, it survived, got flooded in the great Oshkosh flood of 2008 and now, has a tiny green pumpkin on the vine! It is a trooper. Of course, being Wisconsin, the pumpkin is no where near the size of yours!

Speaking of front yard gardens, last year, we replaced half our our front yard with a perennial garden. We removed a really ugly bush and built a retaining wall. Now, with all the flowers in bloom, many cars that drive past slow to look at the flowers. It has really cut down on the mowing time too!

Anyhow, happy gardening!

We live in a small rowhome and when we moved in, I planned a cottage garden in the front lawn. The cottage garden became the ENTIRE front lawn. I dug up the entire lawn (around the tree with the shallow roots, meaning I couldn't use a tiller!) and planted lots of goodies - no veggies, but lots of small bushes, lots of butterfly- and bird-friendly flowers, and I'm of the Darwinian persuasion - if it doesn't make it with pretty much NO care, it doesn't get replanted. That came in handy, because I got pregnant the summer after I dug and planted, and had no energy to take care of anything!

Frankly the SoCal lawn thing has always bothered me. It's a desert but people have such lush green lawns and we're always hearing about the southwestern water shortages. Now I'm living in a reasonably moist part of Australia but there are water restrictions anyway. The front yards look a little scruffy in comparison but so many people have beautiful herb gardens. Also (and I'm only going on about this because people are shoving global warming down our throats), clothes lines outdoors may or may not look attractive but isn't that better than using a dryer?

I think your post was hilarious today, thanks again.

My back yard is downright jungle-y, and not a single blade of grass! Mostly it's wild violets, with a few weeds, but at the back of it there's my pride and joy faerie garden, with some ferns, lots of lilies-of-the-valley (which always make me sing "White Coral Bells" and you're too young to remember that but that's ok) and Jacks-in-the-Pulpits and trillium - and my two precious previous kitties. THe front yard is "grass", although the violets are marching out that way, and by the front door I have Giant Waving Hollyhocks. The mail carrier gallops up, puts the stuff in the box and flees, because the hollyhocks are waving toward her and muttering....I get sobbing calls from the Chemical Lawn people offering free estimates, free services, BEGGING to let them get in here with their little orange flags. 'T'ain't happening, they can just suck it up. Next year I'm making a little sacred garden, probably in the back, with some genuine heritage Indian maize, sage, sweetgrass, and some squash and peas, I think. My back yard is about the size of a ping-pong table, but I love it. And I am SO loving your Lumpkin. That's a veggie with attitude. About today's post? Imagine me holding up a card saying "10"!!

I would love a maintenance free yard but fear if I had no grass I would get all weeds;)Hugs Darcy

I'm amazed that a front garden is a "new" or strange idea. Never occurred to me that lawn was the only way to go! Most people here (UK) and in South Africa seem to have gardens in front of their houses as well as in back... well SA is a bit different cos we're spoilt there, the gardens tend to go all the way around. Usually the veggies go in the back I think, but I've seen plenty of herb gardens etc in the front.

I knew there was a reason why I was stumbling around the Internets in the middle of the night, when I couldn't sleep...
This is one of the topics that's nearest and dearest to me right now.
Yes, I do have a garden in my front yard, and the lawn area has been shrinking steadily, year by year, as the herbs, apple and fig trees, and this year the raised veggie beds, are filling it in a little more...It may not be as pristine as a lawn, and maybe some people consider that 'redneck' - but I think of it as 'going green.' I also consider it to be in patriotically supportive of the red, white and blue...

Eleaonor Roosevelt urged Americans to grow Victory Gardens during WWII, and set an example with one at the White House. Thomas Jefferson grew one as well, and had this to say about it:
"No occupation is so delightful to me as the culture of the earth, and no culture comparable to that of the garden." I don't think of either Eleanor Roosevelt or Thomas Jefferson, as being redneck. I believe there were kitchen gardens at the White House during other presidencies as well, but it's late, and I'm doing well, to remember this much...
There's a petition going around, to encourage the next president (whoever that may be), to set an example to the country, by growing a veggie garden at the White House, once again. If you're interested, you can read more about it at www.eattheview dot org, or www.kitchengardeners dot org.

Even though at this moment in time, you can't "grow food, not lawn," in your front yard - thank you for helping get the word out there about this, so those of us trying it out, don't get quite as many funny looks from the neighbors!

I better try to get some sleep now - I need to turn the lights off - I can hear the zucchini getting restless out there...
:)

YES! I would gladly rip out every weed in our yard and fill it with herbs, veggies, and fruit. We have nothing even close to soil here - it's just this sort of gray, sticky sane - and "real" grass just won't grow. I think an edible yard would be an excellent change. I'm doing pretty well with my tomatoes and peppers (when I remember to water them) and the corner they are in is getting all sort of soil-y. There's another reason to turn my yard into a garden - it would help my dirt!

We have gotten rid of both our front and back lawns and replaced them with clover, other ground covers and perennials. There are Tomato plants and Rhubarb growing in the front and I bet most people who walk by don't even notice. Due to massive amounts of rain this summer it's jungle land out there (we have hostas you could hide small children under). I think we must be doing something right as the Garter snakes have returned (go eat a mouse pal) We have raccoons groundhogs and a skunk but missing this year are the bunnies. No we don't live in the country we live on a busy street in Toronto With the main CN train line to Montreal out the back so it's like living in a ravine with a critter highway that follows the train tracks thru town. Driving around the city you just see more and more people that are doing the same thing every year. Grass is too much work and there are so many alternatives that don't require as much maintenance or chemicals and water to keep happening

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Four and a half years ago, I moved into a little house in a neighborhood. Said house had the prerequisite sodded lawn. The sod-layers were so zealous in their work that they put sod all the way up against the house. I pulled all the next-to-house-sod pieces and extended the back yard. I planted perennials and bushes next to the house, added a small pergola with climbing vines, fenced in the back yard, and fringed the fence area with climbing vines and azaleas of several varieties. I also removed some sod next to the sidewalk in the front of the house and planted blooming perennials. My goal was to eventually remove all the grass and replace it with native-hardy plants. The crape myrtles bloomed like crazy. (The secret is to mulch with biodegradable pine litter from the cat box.)
Then I moved this month to an RV in the woods. I have to start over. BUT there's NO grass!

What you have isn't really a pumpkin. It's a different kind of squash, which is usually grown by people wanting to win contests. If you look at the winners of the big "pumpkin" contests you'll see they're always these lumpish yellow kind of squash, and not regular pumpkins.

You do have time to plant regular pumpkins, by the way, even from seed. If you plant pie pumpkins you'll get cute little orange ones you can use for decorating and for eating. Regular pumpkins aren't bad; they're just not as tasty.

I have no idea whether that thing you're growing will taste good or not, but if you're growing for size you're probably watering a lot and that tends to ruin the flavor of any kind of fruit (yes, squash are fruit).

I have 2 acres, no lawn, it takes way to much water in an area where they don't want you to flush the toilet every time it's used in order to save water in the summer (boy do I get ticked at people putting in pools!). I do have some veggies growing, but since I'm a. lazy and b. a really lousy gardener, I could really have a lot more. Most of the property is done in trees, dirt and rocks. I would love to do more but my husband hates yardwork even more than I do so I get no help. I used to have livestock (horses and sheep) out front and used them as the excuse for why I didn't grow more out there. But they all died of old age several years ago. Now my only excuse is that we live in a high brush fire area, we've been evacuated several times in the past few years and the 2 nextdoor neighbors burned to the ground in 2003. But really, that's a cop out not an excuse. This year I planted my tomatoes in large pots and that's working out really well. No trying to dig in rock hard dirt, no rabbits eating it all before it ripens, no worrying about a rattlesnake hiding under the plants where you can't see it. I think I'll expand the idea and grow more veggies in pots next year and maybe strawberries in hanging baskets from the eaves so that snails can't get to them.

Watering a lawn in a desert area (and most of California is really desert) is so wrong. We have a wooded lot, no lawn. When the kids were little, their clothes had a lot of ground in dirt stains and when my in-laws visit from the Chicago suburbs, they are a bit dismayed because it's not what they are used to seeing. Other than that, no downside that I can see.

I don't know about turning the front lawn into a veggie garden, but I definitely have a fetish for English-style cottage flower gardens which fill up nearly a whole yard.

On the other hand, my grandparent's large backyard is almost entirely planted with tomatoes, flowerbeds, and until recently strawberries.

If I had a choice, I would have no lawn at all. The lawn I do have never ever gets watered. It's meant to go dormant during stressful times, so I let it. I've planted a serpentine border around the edges of my lawn that ranges from 3-8 feet deep. The shady areas are mostly hostas and native woodland plants and the sunny areas are mostly native prairie plants. I have so many birds, bees and butterflies in my yard now! I only water new plants to help them get established. After that, they are on their own and depend only on rain and some help from mulch.

Check out this book: http://www.amazon.com/Bringing-Nature-Home-Sustain-Wildlife/dp/0881928542/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1218904585&sr=8-1

Personally, I think we're meant to share the land with the critters we've displaced. Although we can't replace the square footage where our houses are (except if your house will support a green roof), our yards can continue to help provide food and shelter for wildlife. In addition to losing native plants, insects, and animals, the effects of pavement and lawn on our storm sewers and groundwater is terrifying.

I wouldn't plant veggies that near the road, but I'd plant a few trees! They would make lovely shade thus making your house cooler, block the noise from the street and keep the air cleaner.

Redneck??? That's the silliest thing I have heard. With the price of groceries (and everything else) going up, everyone should be gardening. Think how much better you could eat.

I live in Indiana and we have had a wet year, so my three raised beds of vegetables have not needed a lot of extra water. But, the British fellow, who plants surprise gardens for people (Ground Force, I think) said once that you can water anytime, as sometimes it rains when it is bright sun out, sometimes on cold mornings, so if nature can water at all times-- so can you. It's best to do it when you remember, no matter when that is, rather than not at all.

I have four acres of property and I would put every blessed inch into garden, if I could. It is a waste of time and energy to water, fertilize nd then mow a lawn.

Besides the rabbits and deer who traipse across our land would be in heaven and I could grab a carrot on my way in from the car and eat it.

During the drought in California when I was a kid, my dad took all the flowers out of the flower beds and planted cacti. Lots of cacti.

And those cacti grew and got tall, and bloomed. And while we watched our neighbors struggle to keep their flowers alive during the drought. And our cacti got absolutely huge. Now we have them ringing the house in the flower beds. Mom jokes that no one in their right mind would try to break in through a window because there are cacti all around them, guarding the windows. One wrong move and you would get a nasty stick from any one of many cacti.

I garden in containers- herbs and whatever veggies I can fit into them. It works really well. Baby spinach does well in containers btw..

We replaced our front "lawn" (btw, grass has a very hard time in the Pacific Northwest...unless it is heavily "helped" with chemicals, etc.) with a rockery and native, drought-resistant plants. I know, I know, "drought-resistant in Seattle?" but listen - we normally see zero rain in the summer, so it's important!

Anyway, it's great. Easy to care for, beautiful and productive (lavender sachets, anyone?) and some of it is edible: lavender, creeping rosemary and thyme. As a mid-west native, where grass grows whether you help it or not, I think that if something as lame as grass requires so much work, better to re-think one's lawn. :-)

We don't have many edible plants in the front yard yet, but we've gotten rid of the grass and put in ground covers (that I don't have to mow). I hate lawns. So so boring. We'll be putting in an asparagus patch this fall.

And this past spring we converted a corner of our back lawn to a vegetable garden. We let the sprinklers run exactly how they always do and it's gorgeous. A pox on people who don't think edible plants are beautiful.

I was just telling my man that my ideal place to live would be someplace where we could grow most of our own food (orchard, bee hives, vege garden, chicken coop and crawfish pond). My heart beats faster just thinking about it.

My ENTIRE front yard is a vegetable garden (about an acre). Of course, I live on a fairly large plot of land (many acres), so it's not like anyone can drive by and SEE my front yard. Sitting in the living room, you have a lovely view of the corn and okra patch...redneck, maybe, but I sure enjoy the output from the garden.

I've been trying to convince my husband to replace our front lawn with a garden for years. He is dead against it, as he is change-aversent and sure that people are peeing and vomiting in our front yard on a daily basis (I think this comes from living next to a bar in Philadelphia for a few years).

We've reach a compromise. I'm planting low bush blueberries in the upper part of the yard (we have a short, sloped yard), and he can continue to deal with the lower part of the yard. I suspect eventually he will cave on the whole thing.

There was a very good, fascinating article in a recent edition of the New Yorker about this topic and I loved that it gave the history of lawns and why we have them (we were brainwashed according to the article). You could probably find it online. I have it upstairs and am too lazy to go up there and find the name and the author. I might get the energy to get it for you later. Also, the food instead of lawns topic has been discussed a lot recently on the blog Crunchy Chicken, which I highly recommend. My dream is to one day have a vegetable garden yard too and to live in a place where that's possible. Here in the tropics not many traditional vegetable garden plants grow well.

Have you seen the food network show Jamie at Home? His whole yard is a garden and it's absolutely lovely. I would definitely do something like that. Although, I admit I'd prefer it to be in back so that people couldn't come steal my veggies! Paranoid, perhaps. Practical, definitely.

I don't know if you ever get around to reading all your comments, but I'll put this one up anyway. Here in Australia during the 30's and 40's we had a Prime Minister whose wife could not understand why the grounds of the Prime Ministerial home were taken up with roses. She deemed it irresponsible for the leader of the country to spend money on roses when the country was in crisis. So, she pulled out all the roses, put in acres of vegetable gardens and chickens and fed the whole house for the duration of the her husband's run. She tended the gardens herself, no doubt with some help from the staff. I think she was a great role model for the country at the time.
Carol

Wow-I guess I'm spoiled! We haven't had a lawn for years - just mow it once or twice in the autumn so it doesn't turn into forest. All through the summer there is a changing painting of black-eyed susans, Deptford pinks, orange hawkweed, purple vetch, Queen Anne's lace, heal-all, mullein candles, blue chicory, purple and whire asters, and so on. The vegetable garden is in the midst of all this, and I think it confuses the vegetable plant destroying insects - the garden plants have no insect damage at all. Of course, we live oput in the country, and although the house isn't far from the road (heavy winter snows make long driveways insanity) and so the yard is clearly visible, it's live and let live out here - no town regulations on grass height!

Is your interesting pumpkin a volunteer, perchance? I've had similar surprises in my garden -- usually due to a seed from my home-made compost that has germinated in a flower bed. If the seed in your case was from a hybrid pumpkin variety, it would explain the unusual shape and color -- offspring of hybrids often do not resemble the parent plant.

If you want seeds that produce 'true' plants in future generations, you need to plant varieties that are open-pollinated. Then you can save seeds from them and plant them the following year, with pretty consistent results. I sometimes get wonderful heirloom melon volunteers, if was lucky enough to catch the Old-fashioned Melon Guy at the farmer's market the prior year. Isn't it wonderful what Nature does when we aren't looking?

We live in Phoenix and I have tried some container gardening. Did kind of okay with the tomatoes last year. My granddaughter and I planted pumpkin seeds a few years ago and got some magnificent leaves, but that was it, just leaves. Someday, when I have more time, I will focus on growing salad stuff!

I personally don't know that I would put a garden in the front of the house, but I would put it on the side and back. There are two homeowners on my block that have their gardens along the sides and coming up to the front of their homes and they look just lovely. We often come home from work to flats of different veggies on our doorstep. I see nothing 'redneck' about a garden. I actually think it's rather cool.

It's so funny and coincidental that you mentioned the Edible Estates project today. On Saturday, my husband and I went to the Cottage Industry exhibit at the Contemporary Museum in Baltimore and they had a display of the Edible Estate in Baltimore (http://www.contemporary.org/exhibitions.html). The other displays were just as interesting.

purl -

have you considered putting a little drip system in for your plants? it's easier than you'd think and then you hook up a timer to your outdoor faucet and it's like magic. plants get water and grow for you! you could do the set up in an afternoon - go look for some cute guy at Ace hardware to help you!

I wouldn't think twice about a garden in my front yard. Especially done as nicely as those examples are. But, like you? Landlord would have a fit (tho' we both have our pots of tomatoes and herbs on the front "stoops!" - the landlord lives next door)! Can't quite get them to agree to trim out the trees that are keeping us from having a yield out of those pots, tho'...just a few limbs would let enough sun in to make a difference!
Love the yellow-bellied pumpkin!
(((hugs)))

We rent but our landlord/homeowner doesn't care what we plant or how we landscape as long as the yard looks nice. This year we planted a Key Lime tree and a satsuma(clementine) tree. We have western exposure and the living room is a nightmare in August in Florida so we tossed around what we could plant to block the sun from the living room but that would be practical and we decided on the fruit trees. We may add one more satsuma and a lemon tree before the end of the summer. A friend asked why bother doing this when you rent and it's really about "blooming where you are planted" so if I can leave the yard a bit nicer for the next person that comes along then I don't mind. Anyway once the money is spent it's spent. So if get one good crop of limes or satsumas I've gotten my money back.

Howdeeeee!!
Yup jes addin my 2 cents worth here from Redneck Central in Hoosierville. For the past 2 Springs I have worked at a greenhouse where we sell everything from Perennials and Annuals to Herbs (dude!) and Veggies.Now it could have been a combination of events like an early false start to Spring first week of May...("I just KNOW Spring is here...Let's plant the garden!! Oh no the frost/bunnies/ deer got my beans!!!!)not to mention the gas prices /food shortage/ salmonella tomato scare...but WE RAN OUT OF VEGGIE PLANTS due to the combination of the gardeners buying the seconD round of plants and the slew of FIRST TIME GARDENERS!! I am quite taken aback by the
"gardening is a redneck thing" attitude.I can't decide if it makes me sad or mad and I wholeheartedly support gardening in any way shape or form.I agreen with the lawns are boring/wasteful/time consuming view and I would love to find a farmer who would plant my acreage in sunflowers instead of the boring corn/bean rotation.We put in two raised beds this year for herbs(5 kinds of basil4 thyme,etc...) and the typical tomato/ pepper garden which will be providing the main ingrdients for the yearly batches of fresh salsa. I hope being more self-sufficient and sustainable is a trend we can all get behind no matter where we live.
Garden on people!!!!!

Gardens are redneck? Since when?

Have you ever visited the Gardens of Villandry in France? That is my favorite garden of all time! It incorporates both fruit and vegetables with flowers and changes with the seasons. After visiting I wanted to turn my front, back and side gardens into something similar. My ex wanted to pave everything over. We got divorced instead. :) Now I live on quite a bit of land in a rural area. The first year I grew herbs, strawberries and tomatoes in pots on my patio deck. The deer and rabbits quickly learned to climb stairs and cleaned me out. I'm going to have to fence off an area before I try again.

Growing up my family and the family across the street had gardens and we'd all share what was grown. Anything bought in the supermarket just can't beat the taste, texture and satisfaction found in home grown produce!

I didn't read all the comments, so maybe this has been mentioned, but in my area there is actually a guy who will come and change your lawn over to a garden and do all the work in it for your choice of a fee or a share of the produce! I'd love to do this but the hubby is very proud of his xeriscaping that minimizes the amount of water required for our patch of grass . . . sigh.

We rent a city house and we have the coolest landlords ever. We've ripped out a good portion of the back yard for the "Food Not Lawns" movement and they even let us get chickens! We call it Victor Street Farm, even though it's just an urban lot. I tell you, it has helped with the rising cost of food. One 3lb head of cauliflower costs over $5, while a packet of 125 cauliflower seeds is $3.00! Plus, no chemicals.

You might want to consider growing sprouts, alfala sprout, mung sprout. All you need is mason jars, cheesecloth, and a place inside to let water drain off. Dishstrainers work great for this.