Garden of Vines

Every year around spring time, we pull out the packets of seeds and try to grow some veggies in little pots outside. The problem is that our yard doesn’t get much sun light because there are so many trees, so there often aren’t very many options to chose from that would really be able to thrive out there. This year, however, my mom and I found a good space of flat dirt against the house that got a good deal of light, so we threw on some top soil and pounded in the stakes for a fence.

In past years, our usual crop would be snowpeas, and some times peppers. This time, however, we went all out; Carrot, onions, horseradish, cantaloupe, cucumbers, and pumpkins. It was all so exciting, having always wanted a real garden full of tasty edibles, fresh as can be.

But of course… Nothing in life is that perfect, right? Around this time now, we should start seeing the fruits of our labor (literally), but instead, all I can see are… Pumpkin vines. No, not actual pumpkins, only vines. Not only did they completely strangle and kill all of our other poor sprouts, but they also failed to produce any of their own vegetable! Need I add the fact that the onion was actually alive when we put it in the ground, and now it’s merely fertilizer? All of those plans to make my own pickles, lovely garden-fresh salads… Gone.

My mom was poking through our patch of vines the other day, when out of no where, a different variety of greens presented themselves. Could it be? One of our seedlings survived and had taken root, pushing diligently through the forest of unfriendly greenery and agressive pumpkin plants? Pulling to gentle extricate our only remaining vegetable from the ground, the dirt gave way to reveal…. A microscopic carrot, about 1/2 inch long.

Here’s the picture my mom took of it, on a standard 8 1/2 x 11 inch paper:

Sad, huh? It’s all stem, nothing more. After seeing how underdeveloped it was, she put it back into a little pot of dirt, hoping to remove it from the vicious foe outside and allow it to develop further. As it seems to go in our house in terms of growing veggies, the carrot now seems to be dying. I’m such a sad ex-gardener!

To cheer up the vacant patch of vines a bit, I took to a hobby I seem better suited to, and knit a little pumpkin to supplement where real ones should be.

Cute… but not the same. I still can’t roast or carve a pumpkin made of yarn and fiberfill, no matter how hard I wish I could. Maybe if I leave it there long enough, it will remind this uncooperative plant of what it’s supposed to be making.

To make your own pumpkin for either decoration or to encourage a stubborn garden, the pattern I found can be accessed here at Curly Purly.