Since moving into our rental in 2021, I’ve been wanting to start a little garden in the yard for my mom and I, and as soon as it hit May, ready or not, I made sure to follow through with my intentions. With a few bags of soil, a variety of flower and vegetable seeds, a shovel, cultivator, and gloves (of which already has holes), I got my hands dirty and began my gardening journey.
And oh my goodness has it been a journey — it’s only been a few weeks if you count the seeds I planted indoors at the end of April, but I’m already seeing some of the perennial flowers sprout. The joy of seeing something grow from a small seed into a stem with leaves is so satisfying. Talking to local nursery owners for the paper’s recent Home and Garden section also gave me the motivation to get in there and start. Hearing the stories of how much peace gardening brought into these people’s days sounded wonderful, and I can now confirm it. Every day, unless there’s been rain, I can now be found outside after work watering my plants or pulling weeds — tending to the soil is sort of like a meditation if you think about it. It reminds you of just how alive everything is especially during this season, and how important it is to care for the land and your surroundings, yourself included.
As of this week, I’ve planted over a dozen different plants, from ranunculus, gladiolas, sunfl owers, and zinnia, to tomatoes, lavender, peppers, and cucumber. Plant Masters in Suttons Bay had an amazing selection of flowers available during its spring perennial sale, and I made sure to grab a peony plant that I’m most likely going to put into the ground this week now that we’re half way through May. It’s supposed to start blooming in July, I can’t wait to see what also decides to pop out then.
