Just in case you were curious, I thought I would give a little more background on how I came to be a home gardener: a completely obsessed home gardener.

Wow, that sounds a little weird considering that three years ago I was convinced that I possessed a Brown Thumb of Instant Death to All Plants Under My Care. Ha! But here I am! 

I grew up around gardening. Back in the dark ages of the late seventies and early eighties, it was still pretty common in our area to have a small vegetable garden in the backyard and some flowers out in the front. (That is, the 1970s and 80s. 😉 ) My great grandparents also had a cattle farm that my parents helped take care of, so I was lucky enough to get full exposure to actual farming. However, this did not stop the adult me from killing every poor houseplant that was unlucky enough to come home with me. Who knew you can’t just stick them in some random corner somewhere and water them once a year or so? ::hangs head in shame:: Needless to say, I never pictured myself having a pretty big garden in my own backyard full of vegetables and flowers and bees and butterflies…and occasionally some uninvited birds, rats or opossums.

Some personal…how should I put it… challenges came about a few years ago that left me needing something to distract myself from things I was powerless to control but that had destroyed all peace and joy in our lives. Okay, I’m being a little dramatic there, but it sure felt like that at the time. I had always led a very busy lifestyle that at different times included going back to college, pursuing acting as a hobby among other things. However, I no longer had the freedom to seek distractions outside the home. (Side note: my job at the time counted as part of the…challenges. So it could not be considered a positive distraction.) Around the same time, my husband had mentioned on several occasions that he would like to have an herb garden. One day, I came across some old book on square foot gardening that he had picked up out of the freebie box at McKay’s, a local used bookstore. I must have been pretty bored that day because I just sat down and started reading it. Eureka! This sounded like something my spouse and I could do together to get back some peace and joy! I had not yet learned in our relatively new marriage that he says he wants to do a lot of things in passing then forgets about it. ::cough:: It also never really occurred to me that we weren’t big on “gourmet” cooking, so what the hell are we going to with an herb garden? Anyway… So of course I ran out and bought a bunch of containers and random plants THEN started reading more about what I SHOULD have done. ::sigh:: Remember the jumping in with both feet thing? Yeah, that’s how I roll…and fall on my face, then dust myself off and try again. Fast forward to today: I have over 330 square feet of raised bed space, too many containers to count, flower beds, fruit trees and shrubs; and I feel like I’m just getting started in the direction I want to go with it. Last year, I completed the Master Gardener program through our local UT extension office, though I definitely consider myself more of an Intermediate Gardener. ::giggles:: However, I do feel like I have the knowledge to help out in the community to show people how they can make the world a better place through gardening. Maybe that’s the reason I wanted to start my own blog: to show what it looks like for a somewhat regular person with a crazy life who doesn’t feel like she has a natural knack for growing plants to do it anyway. I definitely see this being about the journey as I don’t see a destination in sight just yet. Hopefully, you’ll think it’s worth taking the ride with me. Just be sure to wear your boots.