Getting Started

Aside from reducing our electricity and water consumption, probably the biggest change to our home is going to be our garden. We only have a small, bare, grassed yard, with very few plants and trees (aside from what Ive planted myself) and being that we are renting,  I would like to take as much as I can to our new home when the time comes for us to move. Also many landlords dont like you digging up the yard to put a garden in, as they are worried that when you move on the next tenants won't maintain it. Therefore Ive decided that the easiest way to go about this is to start a potted garden instead.
You'd be amazed at what you can grow in pots - they're not just for flowers, you know! My plan is to grow a fully functional vege garden, in pots!

Now being that I have three children and money is tight, I need to do this on a budget.
Impossible, you say?
Hardly ;)

Ive managed to pick up some empty styrofoam boxes (the ones broccoli comes in at the supermarket are perfect). These are great for growing all kinds of veges in, such as carrots, potatoes, capsicum - almost any sort of fruit or vege that you can think of can be grown in these with great success.

I'd like to have quite a large variety of produce growing in my garden, and my aim is to introduce something new at the turn of each season. I am quite fond of growing plants by seeds; my children and I love watching the little seedlings grow, and also there is the added benefit of seed being cheaper than plants to buy. So it was a no-brainer for me that our potted vege garden would be started by seed.

I'm a big fan of the savings you can find on ebay, and I found a seller who after spending $20 in her store, gives you free post. Most packets of seeds were only about a dollar each, so for $20 I managed to pick up about 20 different varieties of fruit and vegetable seeds. In each packet there were ALOT of seeds, so Ive decided to share some with a friend :)

Whilst researching the different fruits and veges that I wanted to  buy, I discovered something I'd never heard of before, "Heirloom plants". These are typically plants that have been started many generations ago, and are usually quite hardy, tough plants that live a long time without much care. These sorts of fruits and vegetables are things our grandparents used to eat, and you can find alot of unusual varieties that we dont usually see in the supermarket. For instance, I purchased some rockmelon seeds that dont taste like rockmelon, instead they vary in flavour from a banana to mango taste. I just have one thing to say about that - HOW COOL ARE PLANTS!!! :D
Also, for decoration, I decided to buy alot of purple plants, and plants with purple flowers. (In case you cant tell I like the colour purple lol) I'm hoping it makes our garden look a bit unusual, but fun at the same time.

To maximise 'organicness' in our garden, I'd like to stay away from fertilizers and pesticides that are heavily chemical based. Instead I'm opting to make my own. Ive done alot of research into home made pesticides and guess what - I can make my own by using the plants Im already growing! (more on that in another blog later)

And as for fertilizer, Ive decided to go with a worm farm. It's a bit of fun for the kids, and teaches them that creepy crawlies have a purpose in the garden and arent always pests.

Click on my next blog to see how we made our very own worm farm for next to nothing!