Rain In The Garden!

It has been raining all day, so the garden is getting some much needed water and I am getting a break from watering the plants.  Every time it rains, my pepper and tomato plants grow another inch or two!

When Can You Plant Your Garden?

If you are wondering when you can begin planting your garden, burpee.com has a great tool.  Once you get to their website, enter your zip code into the Growing Calendar and it will tell you your ideal planting date for your area.

I used Burpee's Growing Calendar to find out when I needed to plant my garden!

My Small Backyard Garden

Here are a few pictures of my tiny container garden in our backyard.  Our yard is as big as a postage stamp (we live in a townhouse).  My Kids, Husband and I picked out the plants, then I planted everything while they went out golfing.  Here are a few flowers that we picked out.  We made sure to get full-sun flowers since they are in a sunny area and it gets pretty hot against the privacy fence on most summer days.

We added a few rainbow fans to keep bugs away (plus the kids love to see them spin when the wind blows).

Below, you will see our two pepper plants.  They are both Sweet Bell Peppers.  One is going to produce orange peppers and the other will produce yellow peppers.  I put a cage up in advance to support the peppers when they get to their full height.  Last year, they grew to about a foot over the cage!  Since the pepper plants do not take up as much room as a tomato plant, I was able to put two peppers in one pot.  Last year, I had three pepper plants in one pot and it got a bit crowded!

Below is our tomato plant.  I think it is a Big Boy Tomato.  It said that it was a good container plant and it produced large tomatoes, so here it is!  I bought a better cage this year.  Last year, my tomato plants grew to over 5 feet tall and they were cascading all over the grass from over the cage.  This year, our pepper plants are using last years tomato cage.  This year, I bought a five foot tomato cage.  I could move the side supports up as the tomato plant grows which is nice.  The reason I only put one tomato plant in the container this year is because I went overboard last year.  I think I had 3 tomato plants in this one pot and they went crazy!  The tomato plants were so big that they grew over the cage and along the ground.  Tomatoes were falling off under the plant and I couldn't see them.   The bugs loved it and aphids finally took over the plant.  I will have to make sure the tomato plant isn't crowded and growing on the ground this year!

I found the tomato cage on sale on Amazon for $8.79!  It's well worth it.  That is about what I paid for it at the store.  I would definitely recommend this tomato cage.  It's so much more supportive than the round metal tomato cages.

Happy Spring! It Is Time To Plant Your Vegetable Garden!

Since we moved to Northern Virginia from Indiana, our planting season has begun earlier than I am used to.  I looked up when to plant a vegetable garden and found that I can begin now!

I was so excited that I ran out to my local Lowe's to get a tomato plant and two pepper plants (yellow and orange sweet peppers).  I also went to Costco to get a few bags of Miracle Grow potting soil for $9 per each huge bag.

The reason I am planting so little is because when we moved to Virginia, we ended up in a town house.  Our yard is very small and I do not trust planting a vegetable plant in the ground since it is a new construction area.  I have been told not to plant anything you will eat in newly developed ground.

Last year, I ended up with pots everywhere.  All of my vegetable plants grew like weeds, then crowded each other out and died.  This year, I am going to have a very simple garden: one tomato plant, two pepper plants and some nice flowers.

Last year, my tomatoes grew so tall that they were falling over the top of the tomato cage.  This year, I bought a tomato cage that is 5 feet tall!  I already have it set up around my tomato plant in its own large pot.  I have my old 3 foot cage around my pepper plants in my other large pot.

After planting my tomato and peppers, I watered them until water was running out of the bottom of the pots.

I am so excited to start a new gardening season!

Has anyone else started planting their vegetable garden?  If so, where are you (generally) and what did you plant?

Sweet Pepper Chicken Recipe. Fast, Easy & Inexpensive!

Sweet Pepper Chicken Recipe

Ingredients:

3 Chicken Breasts
2 tbs oil
1 lb of small sweet (red, orange and green) peppers
1/2 small onion
1 clove garlic
3 green onions
2 cans of stewed tomatoes
4 cups of rice

Instructions:

- Prepare rice and set aside
- Cut vegetables
- Slice chicken breasts
- Sautee vegetables in pot with 1 tbs oil until tender
- Remove vegetables
- Sautee Chicken in pot with 1 tbs oil until cooked
- Add sauteed vegetables and the stewed tomatoes
- Simmer for a minute or two
- Add about a cup of rice onto each dish
- Spoon Chicken & Vegetable mix onto rice

- Enjoy!