Baked Peas with Fried Tulips

My garden is suffering.

 I was doing so well taking care of it and I had several very happy pea plants to prove it. Peas that I planted in October. Peas are, after all, the reason I garden.

Then it got really hot followed by several days of thunder storms. Then really hot. Then normal spring weather. During that time we were reminded that our AC unit doesn't work and with the rain I didn't think about watering my beautiful vegetable. Sadly, many of my delicious pods withered and died.

We had also planted 15+ more pea plants along our fence line that the neighborhood cats poisoned for us. There are still a couple that are trying to make it, but I'm not holding my breath. I had 8 more seeds planted in pots, but after leaving it in direct heat (rookie mistake) I've cooked all but two of those bad boys.


My tulips finally popped up. I planted a bag of mixed colors and 5 came up yellow (those will all be going) and only 1 came up red. 1 more was almost red. I failed to water those and they baked in the sun and now I have fried tulip stems.

I tried to grow some old garlic (seed left outside all year-oops) and a few other unknown plants but they never made it out of the seedling pots. I'm not really surprised. They were old!

I promised Cliff I wouldn't tear up the front lawn until I could produce tangible amounts in the back yard, but I'm starting to think that the back yard might be the better location anyway. Less grass on the lawn already. Meaning, less to dig up. Of course there is still the matter of the tree I removed already from my front lawn, but I'll still be replacing that even if my garden doesn't surround it.

All of my garden isn't suffering I suppose. Well, at least not to the point of dead.

I trimmed my citrus trees back a couple months ago but I didn't have a saw to finish the job. Now I'm regretting that oversight. The blossoms smell amazing however! Walking outside in our neighborhood (full of jasmine, citrus, and roses) is such a treat!

My berries are doing well. The blueberry bush looked more like a twig stuck in the ground but it came back to life and so did my Loganberry boysenberry other berry plant. I can't remember what it is anymore, but it's a vine that will produce berries and has thorns. Another one of my neglected (and abused) plants living despite me. It was used as the start/finish line scooter races so I wasn't sure.

I have my screw up of the season as well. I've been really excited to plant potatoes so I purchased some seeds. Then, when I started planting I could only find last years seeds (that were left outside in the elements) and assumed that was all I had. Needless to say last years seeds didn't grow but I did find my bag of potatoes with my canning supplies trying to grow. Time to get them some dirt and hope they forgive me.

I killed my lettuce almost as soon as it sprouted (the newspaper barrier smothered them) so Cliff planted a package of radishes in it's place. Those seem able to grow just fine. Perhaps it's because I didn't touch them at all...

Just one month ago Cliff got me two basil plants for our anniversary (real love comes in dirt!). Good thing he got two because I already killed one. I may have grown a full out basil bush last year, but I'm going to need to tend to them more if I want a repeat of that.


Cliff also added my chives (from seed!) to the pot and they are thriving. I never had any doubt about my ability to grow onions though. Hell, I now have a full pot of (flowering) green onions from the first plant I got almost 3 years ago. I guess the moral of my story is... don't trust me to grow it unless it's an onion.