Nina's Soap

If you live in a house with land you should try to grow some of your own food.

You cannot grow it all but a little makes a big difference in your diet, health, and saves you money over time.

I like to grow more of perennial vegetables and some annuals. Buying from farmers is very expensive. It is good to grow what you can, and buy what you cannot. If you outsource everything, you won’t have any money left and the quality won’t be as good as if you grow it yourself. Research proved that vegetables and fruit lose up to 80% of their nutrients within 2 hours after picking. After that time frame, they don’t lose much of the remaining nutrients. So when you grow your food, you would eat the freshest food ever and at their pick. My kids eats peas, berries, and tomatoes straight from the vine when they go out to play or pick their snack. My little boy likes strawberry. Last summer, He would go after any red fruit in the garden. He doesn’t like blackberry much but when he sees them red which means they are not ripe yet, he would go after them thinking they are strawberries. It can be a battle sometimes when he tries to just pick unripe blackberries living the ripe ones behind.

I used to buy corn from a farm 12 corns on the cob for $5. But when a grocery store had sale in 2017, I bought a lot of corns and caned them. Buying from the farmer doesn’t mean organic. They use pesticide and fertilizer as well. I did a search and found that corn used in corn syrup is genetically modified which makes me think that corn from the grocery store and the farmer are not genetically modified. But we eat so many processed foods that contain corn syrup anyway. So should I spend more buying from the farmer if it is on sale at the store? It is fresher from the farm but my farmer picks hers and stores in a cooler truck which makes me think it is not any fresher. After 2 hours most nutrients are lost. I read that it is good to harvest sweet corn while your water is boiling on the stove. That is when you can eat it and enjoy its sweetness. I don’t grow sweet corn and cannot testify that. I don’t intend to grow sweet corn in my garden I would prefer to stock up when it goes on sale at the supermarket or buy from the farm.  I learned that even peas after few hours of picking, convert their sugar into starch. Therefore, it is good to process them quickly after picking.

Pick your own farms allow you to pick your own fruit and vegetables and it is fresh but expensive. And they may not be organic either. They just spray less. You can see insect bite on the fruit. By the way, insects bite on a fruit is said to be good for you as these insects know what fruit is good for them to eat. Second, when they eat the fruit, the plant create a substance to protect themselves from insects invasion which is our medicine. Trees don’t run away from their enemies. Therefore, God gave them ways to fight which is the source of their medicinal properties we benefits from.

Setting up your garden can be costly at the beginning. But the cost should decrease over time while your harvest should increase. I would write about how much I spent on my garden so far.

My goal is to decrease it over time as I save my own seeds to replant.

Growing our own food is as important as anything else going on in our life. It is our own food. God made our food to be a source of food and medicine for us. Our body intakes vitamins and minerals from our food better than the artificial ones we take. It is a challenge but I am up for it and would be glad to have you on board so that we can share our experiences.

If you intend to grow a garden this year, you should start to plan now and buy your seeds.

Also you should know if your garden will be bothered by deer or bunnies. If so, plan to set fence. It is worth it.

I ordered my seeds already. I also have about 5 gal of beans and 1 gal of peas to shell. They are my saving seeds. I saved more than a cup of lettuce seeds and 4 cups of shell peas from 2017 garden. I saved seeds from parsnip, dill, tomatoes, pepper, cucumber, squashes, and potatoes and would not buy them this year.

Happy Gardening in 2018!