A Very Happy Mother's Day

Even before I became a mother, Mother's Day has meant something important to me: Time to plant my vegetable garden!

Conventional wisdom in the mountains of Western North Carolina is that a hard frost could happen up to this very day, and I have learned the hard way (snow and ice in late April wrecking havoc on my tender blueberry blossoms!) to respect this wisdom.

Yesterday my son and I went to the Farmers' Market to buy seedlings for our garden. Of course I wanted tomatoes galore and we chose many new-to-us varieties based mainly on their delightful names - Mountain Magic (a red slicer, known to be disease-resistant and prolific), Sungold (our one repeat because we all love them so much - they are small and golden and so sweet my son calls them "chocolate 'matoes"), Taxi (bright yellow), Orange Glow (also promising to be hearty and productive and don't they sound like they will be a lovely color?), and Green Zebra (bright green and striped).

We also got some lettuce seedlings and lots of marigolds. I'm hoping to find more greens (spinach, kale and chard) and cucumber starts at the market this Wednesday, but if I can't, I can still start from seed and be all set. (Did you catch that: I'll be at the market this Wednesday to pick up our first CSA box! Hooray!)

This morning my son got decked out in his gardener's garb and we made quick work of the planting.



It is such a happy thing to see all the little plants in their new home.

This week I am rejoicing in being a mama: nurturing young life is a profound joy.