Savvy Eats

“I have a problem,” I told Dan guiltily as I climbed out of the car. I had just made a trip to the garden center for some topsoil and mulch and I got a little…sidetracked. He sighed, “how much basil did you buy?” “Only 1 this time, I swear!” This brought my basil plant count [...]

Since we bought our house in the winter, we weren’t aware of the summertime treasure that came with the backyard: wild black raspberry bushes.  They were overgrown and sprawling, but we decided it must be because the house was vacant for nearly a year, and there was nobody to maintain the yard. Whenever I picked [...]

Slugs have been moving through the Savvy Garden like a windstorm, stripping leaves from every plant in its path. It starts with a few innocuous holes dotting the foliage, and within 2 days, the leaves are gone completely. It started with the mint and sage, then progressed to the peas and beans. I’m hoping to [...]

Last year, I dug up the entire front yard for the garden.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t afford to build raised beds for the front and the back yards, so we decided to test our luck planting beans, peas, spinach, zucchini and carrots directly in the ground. It did not go well, to say the least.  The [...]

With all this warm weather, I’m itching to get my garden planted.  I want to be picking lettuce and arugula and herbs for my salads.  I want to be coaxing tomato vines onto the netted trellis set around the raised beds. But I can’t just yet.  It may feel warm and springlike outside, but I [...]

Guess where these carrots came from? The Savvy Garden! I came to some realizations about my garden this weekend: 1. Having a black walnut tree above our yard means I must be vigilant about removing every single walnut that falls into the raised beds, or some of my vegetables will die. The tree has been [...]

Too often, we get caught up in our day to day routines and forget to appreciate the little things in life.  In my Little Things series, I like to honor the details that are making me happy today, and ask you to do the same! The Little Thing making me happy today is… The Savvy Garden [...]

However, upon reading the seed packets, I found out that all but the basil are perennials. And I realized that if I grew them in pots and brought them inside when the temperatures start to dip in the fall, I could potentially have fresh herbs through at least part of the winter. And with that comes the added bonus of not having to start them from scratch next year.