You would think that I would have known how to garden having had an amazing Grandfather who grew his own vegetables and fruit in season.
I remember as a child breaking the pea pods off the vine and eating them raw and helping grandma to shell them ready for freezing.
We would visit Grandma's house every Sunday after church and there was always produce from her garden on the menu. Her root cellar was always fill to brimming.
My Grandfather on the other hand always gave away to others out of the abundance and there was always a sense of how proud he was when he would see the recipients faces light up with gratefulness.
My parents too have always had an abundant garden and mother has always canned and stored preserves for the winter months. It is shameful to admit but I never learned how to do preserving either.
I remember as a child breaking the pea pods off the vine and eating them raw and helping grandma to shell them ready for freezing.
We would visit Grandma's house every Sunday after church and there was always produce from her garden on the menu. Her root cellar was always fill to brimming.
My Grandfather on the other hand always gave away to others out of the abundance and there was always a sense of how proud he was when he would see the recipients faces light up with gratefulness.
My parents too have always had an abundant garden and mother has always canned and stored preserves for the winter months. It is shameful to admit but I never learned how to do preserving either.
After searching on line to find as much information as I possibly could I stumbled across Starry Hilder and her Back to Eden Garden first created by Paul Gautschi and his lifelong journey walking with God and learning how to get back to the simple, productive organic gardening methods of sustainable provision that were given to man in the garden of Eden.
Having been raised in a Christian home the concept of this type of gardening appealed to me and I set out in September of 2015 to create my own Garden of Eden in our backyard.
Having been raised in a Christian home the concept of this type of gardening appealed to me and I set out in September of 2015 to create my own Garden of Eden in our backyard.
Getting started was interesting - the order of wood chips from a local Tree Services Company took up our entire drive way. Then the fitness routine of moving the wood chips to the back garden took ages.
Finally we put our first garden together from scratch on top of very hard clay stony soil and the results have been spectacular.
The layers to the garden consisted of newspaper, dried fern fronds, compost, a layer of non producing soil, grass clippings, manure, pea straw and lastly the woodchips on top. I left the garden to sit for approximately six weeks watering every day or so to help with the breakdown process before planting kale (which the hens ate), three different tomato varieties, pumpkin, zucchini and white butterfly beans.
Finally we put our first garden together from scratch on top of very hard clay stony soil and the results have been spectacular.
The layers to the garden consisted of newspaper, dried fern fronds, compost, a layer of non producing soil, grass clippings, manure, pea straw and lastly the woodchips on top. I left the garden to sit for approximately six weeks watering every day or so to help with the breakdown process before planting kale (which the hens ate), three different tomato varieties, pumpkin, zucchini and white butterfly beans.
It didn't take long for the garden to resemble something more akin to a jungle and the vegetables were full of taste, contained no bugs and best of all hardly a weed popped up. The ones that did were easily removed. Watering was seldom - perhaps once a week over summer. That particular concept I must admit took me some time to get my head around.
The motivation behind me starting a garden was not only to feed my family more healthy food but I also realised we are living in times that are increasingly uncertain. Many people do not have enough to eat on a day to day basis. Reconnecting with the Creator through gardening has been given me a huge sense of being grounded as I realised the dreams I once had are really not all that important and I was living with the wrong motivations. Sure I will still design clothes and run NZ Eco but it doesn't have me anymore ... I have it and life is in perspective.
"Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and YOU WILL FIND REST FOR YOUR SOULS. "For My yoke is easy and My burden is light." Matthew 11v29-30
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