We finally have everything planted…at least I think so. After Pap died I sort of lost heart for the garden and couldn’t seem to keep my mind on what needed to be done much less keep the whole planting by the signs thing going. For the first time in years our garden has been planted anytime the notion struck us and we had a little time on our hands.
A sneaky rabbit ate most of the beans we planted for Granny so we had to re-plant them. Our beans are up and looking fantastic. Drop back by in a day or so and I’ll take you for a walk around our garden and maybe Granny’s too.
Tipper
My grandmother Cora did everything by the signs. Plant, harvesting, canning and preserving of course but also hog killing, fishing and even hair cutting. She had one of those almanac calendars hanging on a nail in the kitchen. The first thing she did every morning was consult the calendar. That calendar ruled her day. She always had a fine garden and fat healthy pigs, chickens and milk cows.
I remember stopping by her house on the way to go fishing. She said “You ain’t gonna catch nothing!” “How do you know Grammaw?” “The signs ain’t right!” I laughed it off but she was right. I didn’t stop on the way back home. I could imagine the conversation if I had. “How many did you catch?” “I caught 8 or 10 but I wasn’t counting. I throwed ’em all back. I didn’t feel like carrying them home.” “You are telling a story! I told you you wouldn’t catch nothing, didn’t I?”
I remember going to visit her one hot July day. She was out in her garden hoeing corn that was almost shoulder high to her (she was a little bitty woman). She had on her dress, apron, a long sleeved flannel shirt, a pair of high top rubber boots and a big straw hat. I asked her if she wasn’t burning up in all that. She said “It’ll keep the heat out just like it keeps it in.”
Grammaw lived to be 96 so she must have been doing something right.
Tipper,
I”m looking forward to seeing and hearing your take on Gardening. This makes a year since I fell and hurt my back, and at my age things don’t heal as good as they use to. I was always glad to get the Planting by the Signs Calendar cause I believe in the signs, if the weather permits. I’ll be the first to admit, there have been times my planting was Not by the signs. Things were still OK, but I just feel better to go by them…Ken
My Mamaw Lewis planted by the signs and always had a really good garden.Was the signs or all that horse manure?
I had an old friend who told me he was planting beans when a neighbor came by.This was during the great depression.The neighbor asked Press if he was planting by the signs.Press told him he was planting in the ground.The neighbor said you’ll have a flower garden.Press told me he had the prettiest flower garden you ever seen.
Hi Tipper,
Our gardening this year, has been the same way. We have planted when we had time and the ground was dry. I wouldl love to have the luxury of being available to do the work on the days that are optimal for the plant, but sadly I still have to work for a living.
Know that time will help the sharp pain of loss to become more muted and bearable. Know that your Dad has his new body in Heaven and he would not want to come back here to this World. Know that you will see him again.
Hugs!
You won’t believe this, Tipper, but it’s only been in the past two weeks that it’s been warm enough to plant here…and it went overnight from cold eough to wear a woolen hat to the high-80s and humid! I don’t know what to expect next.
My first planting of beans and cucumbers is just coming up, and I’m trying to keep planting a little bit every time it’s bearable to be outside. I’m covered in skeeter welts despite using bug spray…did your herbal-studying gal ever make her own jewelweed salve? I’ll be her first customer if she decides to sell some!
Once people began doing what my Dad called “public works” in the 1929-30’s gardens had to become ‘as we can’. I expect an early part of that was relaxing planting by the signs. It was a sea-change in lifeways. There were so many changes that came in a short time.
We are hurting here for rain. Between the end of spring cool and the onset of summer thunderstorms we often have 3-4 weeks of little rain. It comes just at a time when everything would grow fast if the rain didn’t stop.
Gardening has a lot of lessons. One of them is taking things as they come, like the weather.
Glad you’ve got the gardens planted. Ours has been a comedy of errors this year. I had to replant all my purple hull peas as only a very few came up. and it rained so much we couldn’t get stuff planted. We couldn’t get our straw to put down like we usually do but are hoping to get it next week.
Anyway, my son has done most of the planting and planted half the garden with his favorite sweet corn. He had even hoed it out once & it had weeded up again. It was so weedy my husband decided to till and got his wires crossed & tilled up all the sweet corn! My son said he was so happy when he saw that his daddy had tilled and then it slowly dawned on him with horror that his corn was gone. So I had to go and buy some more seeds–$14.00 for a pound!! “The Kid” as we call our son has started a song about this wrenching experience, “Daddy went down to Clarksville, he was looking for some corn to kill”.
We still haven’t caught the groundhog but have two traps out and got a new electric fence that is stronger than the old one. So far I’m the only one who hasn’t got shocked. Last year our green beans looked like someone trimmed them with scissors so we’re hoping the fence will stop the critters. The rabbits and squirrels around here are slick and fat and don’t need to be eating my garden.
Time will take the rawness out of that tender wound. I saw your garden the other day and everything is looking great, especially the beans.
I have Mulberries ready for jam. They come very early in the season.