I started reading a lot this year about gardening. I grew up with everyone I know gardening. Both of my grandfathers gardened and so did my dad. Everyone was doing it. I feel like maybe I should do it too.

I started out reading a great book on the topic called The Backyard Homestead [smile.amazon.com/The-Backyard-Homestead-Produce-quarter/dp/1603421386]. I initially found this book at a book warehouse and talked myself out of it because at the time we were living in an apartment and didn’t really have the room to garden. Then I was looking through Amazon one day and wouldn’t you know it, the very same book was on sale! I snatched it up this time and voraciously read it.

Since we’re living in a town home, we have a little bit of backyard space now. It’s not much but I’ve got about 10 square feet of usable space. I wanted to plant something this year but the area I wanted to use wasn’t ready so I settled for some container gardening. I grew some basil, another herb, cat grass for the cats. It went pretty well until I forgot to water them for a single day. That particular day, the temperature got into the 100s so that was a bad day to not water them. I tried to resuscitate them but was unsuccessful.

Next spring, I’m planning on using my little bit of space to plant a few things. I’d like to plant spinach, broccoli, and a tomato plant.