Ty tilled a new garden for me at the back of our property. It was covered with weeds and thistles, so he hacked and tilled, and now the Iowa soil is free. How kind of him to run that jarring machine. He knows how much I love to garden, and he wants us to grow as much as we can. There is a little fear running through the background that there might be a shortage of certain foods, or the virus may harm our field workers and prevent us from getting vegetables. No one can know these things for sure, of course, but we plant for our family.

I’m planting 12 potato plants back here. I got seed potatoes online, and I’m not sure how they’ll do. For one, they came freeze dried with no visible eyes, and I’ve read the eyes need to be planted up to the sun. Second, I have never had much luck with potatoes. Most things I throw in the ground grow and produce. I’ve tried potatoes twice. The first time, no potatoes. The second time, 5 or 6 came from the one. So, I’m at 50%. We’ll see. Jude looooves potatoes, so he’s looking forward to the possibility.

I’m also planting the pumpkins, squash, and zucchini back here, where they have lots of room to spread and run. I’ve done well with pumpkins in the past. One year we threw our jack-o-lanterns off our deck and three pumpkin plants grew 7-8 pumpkins just in time for the next Halloween. I’ve never done squash, but the boys love to eat it. And, last season, Morris and I grew zucchini in our garden beds but learned it was easy to run out of room in there.

We’ll see what this garden does. I’m pretty excited to have another one!