Still getting sermons in a garden patch

It's amazing how God speaks to me through my little garden. This time he used my husband, too, to remind me of a few things. I was out tending it. I'm finally able to get to the garden. My back was fixed! Amazing! We finally figured out what was wrong. I took a really bad tumble last year in my alley because my dog cut in front of me while I was running with her and she tripped me. I landed EYE first, then shoulder, with my hand tucked under me holding the leash. Apparently I knocked a couple ribs out of place. My insurance doesn't pay for a chiropractor, but they do pay for therapy. Luckily the therapist does something like chiropractic work. She popped it back in. I can do yard work again for the first time in about 4 months.

So, I was working in the garden. I have green beans, vining up a trellis, and cucumbers, doing the same thing. I realized that the cucumbers had vined outside the fence. We had taken down a Japanese holly berry tree next to the garden patch (or at least the lower branches of it - we plan to take it all the way down later), as well as clearing out a rotten stump. We left one stump that the tomato plant is resting on. It's a plumb cherry plant and is making me a bumper crop. Luckily it's coming in with a handful a day, instead of more. We're keeping up. Otherwise, I'll have to can them.

But I decided to try to get the cucumber vine out of the fence. My husband reminded me of the Bible verse where they talked about what falls on the ground is supposed to be left for the poor. It's called the gleanings. He said leave it for people who walk down the alley. Right now there are only 2 blooms on the alley side, so there will only be 2 cucumbers there. He said if no one picks the cucumbers, then we'll get them. But if someone picks the cucumbers off the plant, they needed it worse than we did. I said, "Honey, you're right." I hadn't looked at the beans yet, but they had done the same thing. So I'm leaving them, too. Gleanings for the neighborhood. If humans don't need them, the birds can have them. I have wind chimes to keep squirrels and birds away from my garden, but not in the alley. The wildlife or human life can have it.

Other than that, it's not going too badly. Because of being down with my back, the weeds totally took over the patch with the beets. I planted an English walnut in a bucket, and it's doing great. I took out dirt from the compost and it grew cucumbers. I transplanted 6, but only 2 didn't burn up. My avocado hasn't sprouted yet. We'll have to see how it goes. We plan on taking out the pom pus grass and the tree that I'm not sure what it is. It flowers in the spring, but we have another one just like it in the alley. We need the sunshine. We're also taking out the holly and the other shrub along the fence row. I can plant something that vines up, like beans or peas after the carport next year, but the carport shadows too much before that. We also cut the lower branches on the oak tree so the hanging tomato plant gets more sun.

So, we're leaving gleanings for the people who walk down the alley, but we're also dehydrating mushrooms for putting away in case times get tough. And, with Aldi's being in town, we're able to stock up on canned food. I'm keeping a list of what I have, and trying to figure out what meals I can make with what I have, not just storing canned goods willy, nilly.

Lori Ann Smith