Gardening is more than the vegetables

When Hanno removed the fence from the front of our kitchen garden it created space for a seat looking into the garden. Yesterday I showed you the seat we placed there, a recreated wonder of wood and steel, now sitting under the elder tree, overlooking the greenery and the chicken coop beyond. What a grand spot to sit and think about the harvests to come and future gardens, or to just rest awhile. Every garden needs such a place, every one of us deserve one.

 The latest crop of potatoes is breaking through the soil.

Corn at both ends. Some almost ready to harvest, some just planted. There are also Daikon radish, heirloom tomatoes and lettuce - again, some ready, some just planted.

Gardening is not only about the work involved, it's about reconnecting with the earth and touching things that are natural and honest. It's about renewal and recovery.  Ask any gardener how they feel after they spend time in their garden and although many will tell you they're tired, many more will say they feel relaxed and energised.  You can discover your creative self in a garden, and given half a chance, gardens have the power to heal jagged nerves and soothe troubled minds. What better place to breathe deeply and let go of your stresses - it's all fresh air, sunshine, seasonal smells, migrating birds or visiting local ones, bees buzzing, the sounds of your neighbourhood, and you.

 Portuguese cabbage is flowering. Soon we'll harvest the seeds for next year.

Here we have Daikon that is flowering much too early, before the radishes are long enough. We won't collect this seed.

Never go into a garden and expect perfection. It's probably there at various times but you'll more likely encounter spent leaves, weeds, empty spaces and overgrowth. But keep looking because you'll also find seeds germinating, flowers half open, bees collecting pollen, wasps looking for water, vegetables growing to plump maturity and vines twirling and snaking along a fence. Take some time to sit and look around. In our garden there is a distinct feeling of abundance and growth, and when you stop and take time to really look, even when nothing is happening, everything is.

This corn will probably be ready to pick next week.

When something is harvested, we used that space again, straight away, with followup seedings.

Our garden is a productive kitchen patch, not a show garden. There are plants ready for harvest and those just planted, follow up seedings go in whenever plants are past their prime, it changes constantly, it keeps delivering its promise over and over again. There are weeds - chickweed grows wild here, and will do until we mulch properly. That's fine with us. We don't mind the weeds. They'll be removed when we have the time, now there is other work to do - work that will help boost production and keep the vegetables growing. The weeds will wait till we have time for them.

I have been a vegetable gardener for more than 30 years and I am thankful that my life has moved in ways that allowed me to spend time in many productive vegetable gardens. Sometimes I wish I was a novice again - taking those first steps towards organic gardening, remembering plant names and the conditions they need. They were exciting days, when I realised that the work carried out each day sowing, planting, clipping, mulching and watering would result in harvests fit for a king's table. But there were also days when just being in the garden was enough. Gardening never gets old and boring, it gets better the more you know. If you're at that first step stage, I envy you. The wonderful world of microbes, insects, flowers, plants, seeds and the freshest of vegetables is at your finger tips.

When you look around a garden, even the most humble like ours here, you see the birds flying through, bees dipping into flower heads, clothes drying on the line, a cat asleep on the straw mulch and vegetables waiting to be picked, you feel that anything is possible. And maybe, here in the garden, it is.