Thank goodness for fences.  Ours hides an inumerable amount of sins, from weeds to broken toys, a kite stuck in the stick of a tree we planted, and colored chalk on every flat surface.  It is my family’s outdoor haven, and last year, I made it a quest to make it an educational area for my kids as well.

We started small, with pots.  We had recently put in new landscaping, so the pots that the new plants were originally in became the basis for our container garden last year.  My boys put a small amount of dirt in an egg carton and germinated seeds indoors. We were successful with beans, carrots (amazingly enough), squash and canteloupe.  I bought small tomato plants and bell pepper plants for them.

Once the seedlings were large enough, we transferred them over to the pots.  The nice thing about the pots is that we could easily move them to make room for backyard adventures and didn’t run the risk of our little plants being trampled.  Our tomatoes grew and grew, and we ended up with about a dozen cherry tomatoes from them.  There would have been more, but a certain three year old loved to pick the pretty green ones. 

Our bell peppers fared well, too. We discovered that they were much more productive on our porch than in the yard, though.  So, yet another perk to container gardening, we moved our peppers to the porch .  The beans made huge bushes, but our Texas weather became too hot to produce too many beans.

The carrots were not so lucky.  To grow carrots, the gardener must possess an extraordinary amount of patience, something small children simply can’t stand at a young age.  Our carrots were orange and about 2.5 inches when we plucked them from the ground.

Amazingly, our canteloupe was the best-growing plant we had.  In fact, our canteloupe did so well that we started burying the seeds, guts and rinds after eating them.  And MORE canteloupe plants came up!  Canteloupe seem to be quite versatile, grow quickly, and are a fine example of the entire plant process, from seed to fruit and back to seed.

This year, we’ll continue with our planting, and we’ll include some measuring, charting and a little friendly competition between the pots.  Our plants will indeed be in pots again.  If for nothing else, they are great in an obstacle course!

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