08/19 2015

Years ago I realized that I had failed to teach my children what carrots actually looked like.  They could tell you were to get baby carrots at the grocery store and would gobble an entire bag of them in one sitting, but they didn’t know that carrots grew with green tops out of nutrient rich soil.

Farmer N

One day N told me that he wanted to be a farmer for Halloween.   I was so excited to buy him overalls and a handkerchief for the outfit. Then he decided that he wanted to pass out fresh vegetables to houses instead of getting candy. I personally loved the idea so I set out to find farm fresh carrots in our town. I checked the usual locations, the 2 grocery stores, Walmart and Target. None and I repeat, NONE of them had any carrots with green tops. Right there and then I decided that we would grow carrots in a garden the following summer. We did just that.

The next summer we planted a small garden in the back of our yard on top of the hill. It was the perfect size for us to learn on. We were able to plant a few rows of carrots, some green beans and 2 rows of corn.

The kids and I were excited everyday to weed the garden and to see what plants had grown over night. The food didn’t’ last long that year. Most of our garden was consumed for “snacks” that summer. The kids loved being able to walk into the garden, pick a vegetable and to eat it a few minutes later.

The best part about creating a garden for our family is that it gave us another activity to do together and it helped us discover how much better fresh heirloom vegetables taste compared to the items we were buying at the store.

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