The Start Of Gardening 2012

It's exciting to start something new, isn't it? Our passion to start a garden in 2012 stirred when my husband, daughter and I went to a local farmer's market. We were amazed by the fresh peppers, zucchini, onions, garlic, okra, pure honey, peaches, homemade strawberry jam, pears, and apples. The taste of all of these was out of this world wonderful!

My daughter was 2 years old at the time.

I remember this day clearly, I decided to make a simple vegetarian stuffed pepper. I wish I had the photo I took. Sadly, it disappeared somehow.

Here's the recipe:

• 6 medium-sized red or green peppers
• 1 large onion, diced
• 1 medium zucchini, chopped
• 1 cup white rice, cooked
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp pepper
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp smoked chili powder
• 1/2 tsp Sazon Seasoning (You can find this in the World Food section at your supermarket)
• 1/2 tsp Adobo Seasoning (You can find this in the World Food section at your supermarket)
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped (I love garlic, use less if you don't like garlic)
• 1/8 cup of olive oil
• 4 medium-sized tomatoes, chopped
• 1 1/2 cups of grated sharp white cheddar

Always start off with cooking the white rice first. Scoop 1 cup of rice in a pot and pour 2 cups of water (add a pinch of salt), heat to a vigorous boil. Once the water is boiling, put a lid on and set over a low heat for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes is over, set the pot away from heat. DO NOT REMOVE LID! Keep the lid on for 5 more minutes. 5 minutes later, fluff your rice with a fork.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Carefully, cut the tops off the peppers. Set tops aside. Scoop out the seeds and membrane. The white part of the peppers are bitter, you should try and cut out as much as you can. Place the peppers in a greased baking pan cut side up. Get creative to try and keep them from tipping over.

Heat 1/8 cup of olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Cook the diced onions until somewhat transparent. Add zucchini, garlic, and tomatoes. Cover pan with a lid, simmer for 20 minutes on low heat. By this time, your rice should be done and fluffy.

Next, place the rice into the pan of vegetables. Season with salt, pepper, onion powder, smoked chili powder, sazon, adobo. Add more salt and pepper to your liking. Mix all ingredients together and cook on low heat for another 5 minutes. Turn heat off and let it sit for 5 minutes, let the wonderful seasoning marinate in the vegetables.

Slowly and carefully, scoop the rice/vegetable mixture into the peppers. Top with cheese. Cover the peppers with the pepper tops you cut off earlier. Pour a small amount of water into the bottom of the pan. Drizzle the peppers with olive oil, cover with foil and bake for 30-35 minutes.

Enjoy!

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How can we get those fresh, beautiful tasting vegetable like the ones we bought? We started planning our own garden! My husband and I knew nothing about gardening. Just place a plant in any type of soil and it'll grow, right? (Family Feud NOPE buzzer went off) We made some silly and expensive decisions but it's okay, “We don't make mistakes, just happy little accidents.” ...Thank you, Bob Ross. ;-)

Here are some photos of our FIRST EVER gardening and livestock experience. It's okay, you can laugh because my husband and I laughed while looking back at these photos!

We decided to get a Lime and Lemon Tree for indoors because why the hell not? They eventually died because we didn't care for them properly.

Bought full-grown hens and 3 roosters because again, why the hell not? Look at how cute they were! We had 3 roosters-Gaston, Bubbles, and Humpty Dumpty. That was a horrible idea getting 3 roosters. Can you guess which rooster was Gaston?

YAY! GOT OUR FIRST EGG!!

THEN, we bought chicks and baby ducks because again and again, why the hell not? We know what we're doing! ;-)

They grew up to be such cuties! We absolutely loved them but they were also severe terrors when it came to the garden.

Now, our first 30x30 garden. This is where we had no idea what we were doing. The first mistake, we removed all of the sod. The second mistake, we tilled the soil.

The soil looked like it needed help, of course, it did, we just disrupted the soil. We decided to put some cardboard down to bring some moisture back to the soil, fertilize and bring on some worms.

We planted and those gorgeous plants began to grow. It's exciting to see a small plant can grow into a full grown plant.

OUR FIRST EVER HARVEST! These veggies were absolutely mind-blowing​. They tasted so good.

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My husband (https://steemit.com/@theferalone) and I enjoyed every moment of our mistakes and our successes​. There was so much fun and purpose that was introduced into​ our lives!

What we would have done differently was first sheet mulch or lay landscaping fabric to smother the weeds/weed seeds. By removing the sod and tilling, we depleted the soil life and organic matter and were left with weedy depleted soil. Sheet mulching, or smothering out the grass and weeds with fabric​, actually increases soil life while destroying weeds and their seeds.

Our garden in the next years, ​began to improve, flourish with more rich soil and we started seeing more animals, such as ​frogs, grasshoppers, butterflies and more. 2013 Garden will be coming up in another post! :)

Sadly, we had to give away our chickens and ducks, as our neighbors​ called the police. It was against the city's ordinances to​ have any livestock. Even though we have 18 acres of land and our closest neighbor is about 500-600 feet away, we are still technically within the city limits. We fought this, but, due to small-town politics, we lost.

Thanks for reading!