Friend and reader, Loretta lives in Ohio. Her husband ordered the book Organic Gardening – Cutting through the Hype to the 3 Keys to Successful Gardening for her birthday at the beginning of this year.
She was excited and wrote to me saying that at age 57, this would be her first garden!
About every month after that she wrote updating me and/or asking questions.
In July she let me know that she got the garden in late because it was so wet. She wasn’t sure if the season would be long enough for her to see much produce from it.
She also told me that although she had not yet incorporated all the ideas she learned in the book, she still wanted to get things started.
And indeed she did as you can see by the picture below! Great job!
Loretta’s beautiful new garden!
On August 30th Loretta wrote the following:
Hi Theresa,
Everyone is amazed at my garden. Everything is growing like crazy! (with minimal weeds) I have been harvesting lettuce, spinach, beet greens, lots of herbs, sugar pods, zucchini, yellow squash, acorn squash, tomatoes, onions, cucumbers, peppers.
Still waiting on green beans, sunflower seeds, beets, celery, and at least 5 nice sized muskmelon. I never knew that celery grew on top of the ground! I didn’t really think the celery would grow…so I didn’t research it. Someone told me you should put it in a container to form it. But…it’s doing well.
My sister planted her garden with traditional methods and used Miracle Grow and other things. My garden was made with the raised beds (not with boarded sides) and permanent walkways, and I used only leaves, straw, leaf humus compost. There is such a huge difference between not only the plants but the quality of the vegetables that I get compared to hers. You can visually tell a difference…mine look so much more healthy. I am amazed.
I’ll have to send some updated pics.
Thanks for all your advice! It’s really paying off!
Loretta
And then she sent me this picture showing her harvest of August 30th.
On September 8th she harvested her first melon EVER! How exciting and how beautiful!
I am so proud of Loretta and congratulate her on her efforts and her success!
Final Thoughts
A lot of information out there makes folks think gardening is difficult and complicated. But take it from me (and from Loretta) it’s not. All you have to do is basically follow the 3 Keys I’m always telling you about and then just tend your garden. Nature will do the rest.
Happy Gardening!
_____________
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Loretta – Nice job
Theresa, this has to make all your hard work worthwhile.
Agreed Don!
Theresa
Beautiful garden and beautiful harvest! That melon looks delicious!
Way to go Loretta!
I just can’t recommend Theresa’s book highly enough; if anyone is doubting the results just look at that picture!
Tremendous! Amazing bounty! Gorgeous food. Thank you Theresa not only for sharing the story and photos, but also for teaching us such a successful way of gardening! The time and effort you put into your blog, personal emails, your book are so invaluable to us.
One thing I was so shocked about was how little time it took to maintain the garden. I remember reading in Theresa’s book about how little time she spent weeding and maintaining her garden and I thought to myself…yeah right. She wasn’t kidding!
My sister and other friends were spending so much time weeding and maintaining their gardens and I spend about 8 to 10 minutes a day pulling just a few tiny weeds here and there. It was pretty effortless.
Everyone laughed and shook their heads in the beginning for making all those raised rows because they had never heard of the concept…but I ignored them and I am so glad that I did. It was a lot of work in the beginning to make the garden but it was so worth it in the end. And now everyone is thinking about making their gardens like mine. 🙂
Yes, Patricia, Loretta’s melon looks so good my mouth started watering the minute I saw it!
Julie, thank you for your recommendation. That helps new readers who don’t know me, know that it’s really true!
Toni, you are so welcome! I have the best readers in the entire world (like you) and it’s really a pleasure to be of help.
Loretta, your story is WONDERFUL and has got to be one of the BEST I’ve heard!
I can relate to everything you said including your saying “— yeah right”—-.
My way is so very simple and I think people tend to think it’s just too easy to be true. But as you know — it is true and just about anyone can do it. All that’s required is a strong desire and effort — especially to start. Thank you so much for sharing your GREAT story!!
Theresa