Happy May Day!

May 1 is a day of many holidays. It is known as May Day, the feast day of St. Joseph the Worker, and proclaimed by President Eisenhower in 1958 as Law Day and Loyalty Day. This article will focus on May Day.

May Day has been a day to honor the goddess of fruits and flowers, Flora, by the Romans. It was a day dedicated to Robin Hood, in England, as that was the traditional date of his death. Villagers elected a queen of May, danced around the Maypole, and celebrated with games and festivities. In the United States, some of the European traditions still remain. Some children still dance around the maypole, which is decorated with streamers or ribbons.

One of the favorite traditions of May Day has been to create May baskets, usually filled with freshly picked flowers, dandelion flowers, or clover flowers. These baskets are hung on the doorknob of neighbors’ homes, the doorbell is rung, and then the deliverer runs away; leaving a nice surprise for the homeowner.  *Which is what we did growing up...  It ended in a kiss from the recipient.

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"Mary, Mary quite contrary... How does your garden grow?"

Well, here is how our garden is growing.   Little, but it is growing.  Jim and I decided last year that we would plant a garden in our backyard.  Well, that didn't happen last year... it has been 25 years or so since we last planted a REAL garden.  Not just flowers or piddly stuff... a REAL garden... So this year we bought seeds, which was a 1/2 day job on the internet... Survival Seeds... we couldn't find any seeds at first... No one local had any seeds... so we went online.  It was even hard there... but my husband doesn't give up easily... We bought almost $100 worth of seeds online.  They came in this little biddy gold envelope with lots of little baggies of seeds.  Wow... I wasn't expecting that tiny envelope... But... they are SEEDS!  So...  We planted our garden with the help of our (almost) 3 year old granddaughter, Kaylin... 

 

Good Friday, was the day we planted.  Jim made it a raised bed using old railroad ties that were dried out and had a load of good topsoil brought in.  He marked off the rows and we decided what to plant.  We planted... watermelons, honey dew melons, red potatoes that Kaylin is planting here.  Broccoli, cauliflower, green beans, peas, celery, beets, cabbage, 2 types of lettuce, brussel sprouts, spinach, onions, carrots, and tomatoes... plus a few others.

 This is how we marked off our rows.  Just wrote on the sticks we tied strings onto and ran from one side to the other to keep our rows straight. Ok... This is how it started on Good Friday, in March.  Today... this is how it looks.  

 

We also planted 5 grapevine on one end and put up fencing to support that grapevine when it grows.  Who knows... in a year to two, maybe we can make our own wine. :)  (Maybe I will blog that when it happens!   We also added a "knockout rosebush" on each end of the fence... I saw on "Pinterest" that planting a rosebush on each end of your grapevines will keep bugs off the grapes and onto the rosebushes.  And you know if it is on "Pinterest"... it has to be true :) ... So, why not!  It's pretty and it might just work!

It's really growing!!!  This picture I just took!!!!  Yeah!!! ... Ok... the tomato seeds are barely above ground, so we went to Sweetwater Farms, local nursery here and bought 5 tomato plants, already about 18" tall with tiny tomatoes on them.  They said the seeds would never make this year... so we had some help here.

Well, I hope you have enjoyed my gardening this year!  This is a year of firsts... in a long time for us!  Our yard is blooming and it looks very pretty.  In Texas, we have a mean sun, but we even put in our own water well this year to help that out... Jim put us in a large sprinkler system a couple of years ago, so our yard and our garden will get wonderful well water.  Well, that being a deep subject, I will end this garden party and hopefully you will share some gardening ideas with me.  Hope to hear from you soon!    

HAPPY "May Day" / GARDENING!!!    Karen