My earliest memories were of growing a vegetable garden, and my Mom canning everything she could. Growing up, I hated the garden,
and all of the work that went with it. There were four of us kids, and later a fifth, when a friend gave each of us a Marigold, and that was
the beginning of my interest in flowers, at the age of six. My Grandmother Rose, of course liked roses, but she had lots of different kinds
of flowers, and she was an early inspiration. As I got older, I really began to love gardening, and bought a few acres next door. These
days I have a really bad back, but the garden is what keeps me going. I grow lots of things that are out of the ordinary (heirlooms) and
also like to produce my own seed for an even greater challenge. I grow lots of different kinds of fruits and vegetables, and do a lot of
canning every year, but my biggest passion these days are the daylilies, and growing seedlings. I grow mine in rows 100 feet long, and
use a rototiller to go between the rows. I would love to have the formal gardens with mixed annuals and perennials, but can't keep them
weeded. There is still a nice assortment of perennials mixed through my garden, but each year more and more are discarded as my
daylily project increases. Here in my town very few people have a garden at all, preferring to keep everything mowed. I am so glad for
growing up when I did, and learning to grow things.
