The farmer's field across the road seemed a visual extension of my own front gardens.
Front Garden in Spring.
South Front Garden in Summer.
My goal - one of them - when living and growing myself at the Cottage was to experiment with raising most of my own food and herbal medicines.
The food I grew consisted of fruits, vegetables, and eggs from my own Chicken Girls. Herbs were both flavoring and pharmacy.
A typical late Summer/Autumn afternoon's harvest. Freezing, dehydrating, cold-storage, and canning were the means used to preserve foods for Winter use.
Canning is an enjoyable pastime that results in good things to eat all year long.
Un-waxed and organic, my homegrown apples were crisp and delicious and made the best canned juice ever!.
The Kitchen Garden was the main food production area. A large raised bed, asparagus bed, strawberry bed, herb garden, and two moderate soil plots were all I needed to grow 80 percent of my food needs.
Best for juice, jam, syrup, and cordial, Nanking cherries taste just like canned pie cherries.
Berry plants thrived around the Cottage.. I harvested elderberries, raspberries, blackberries, gooseberries, currants, Nanking cherries, and strawberries.
Four apple trees - three old enough to produce - plums, pear, mulberry, and a peach tree are also planted on the property.
Grape vines - both red and white types - provided juice for wine, juice, and jelly.
These girls are curious about the grape harvest.
Ahhh....the chickens! I came to love the sight and sound of the Girls as they pecked and scratched for bugs, and ate kitchen scraps and weeds. Their eggs, so fresh and tasty, were a welcome addition to meals.
Chickens can be quite tame! The Little Red Hen liked to sit on my lap.
One Spring I raised my chickens from wee, fluffy "peeps"!
These girls have untied my shoes and are very curious about the shoelaces.
The Girls cluster behind the gate hoping I'll let them into the Kitchen Garden for a snack.
The Back Garden was a lovely place to sit, think, journal, read, and watch the chickens.
The Orchard Garden is a nice spot to sit, gather apples, plums, rhubarb and dill. A small peach tree awaits maturity and fruit-bearing.
Welcome to the Kitchen Garden!
This raised bed in the Kitchen Garden has since been replaced by a sturdy cinder block raised bed.
All the raised beds in the Kitchen garden have been replaced with cinder blocks.
A basket of lavender and lemon balm, just a few of the herbs growing in the Cottage's gardens.
A Summer morning's harvest of herbs for food and medicine.
Purple dame's rocket in bloom in the Kitchen Garden.
The Cottage's gardens provided well for me. Beauty, scent, food, flowers, herbs.
I'm often asked, "Is it hard for you to leave your lovely Cottage and its gardens?"
To this I say that life is lived in phases and cycles. A wise person knows when it's time to move on...to close one cycle and step into another. For me, that time has come as I begin new adventures.
We never lose what we've learned. We carry our knowledge, memories, and loves in our hearts forever.
Each new cycle brings new learning, adventures, and passions. Nothing is lost. We are the containers of all we've done and there's room yet for all that we will do.
* * * *
Comments