Master Gardener Reflections: What Brings Joy in the Garden?

The Durham County Master Gardener blog writers share what brought them gardening joy in 2024--new plants, new methods, and new ways of seeing and connecting. Read about their discoveries and delights in their own gardening journeys.

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Homegrown Corn

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There are some things we grow in the garden every year. The garden “staples”, the things we eat a lot of, the things that grow well here, and the things that we preserve for the winter. Then there are some experiments in the garden each year. Things that we grow because we’re curious. They are sometimes things that don’t necessarily grow the best where we are, but we want to try them anyway. Things like sweet potatoes, for instance, and watermelon (we haven’t given up on that yet.) Growing corn was not really an “experiment”, we’ve grown it in the garden plenty of times before. We don’t grow it every year, though, because we have limited space and limited sun, so we usually devote that growing space to other things. Honestly, corn doesn’t grow the best in our little garden spot, but we like to grow it from time to time anyway. These pictures were from corn that we grew in last year’s garden. Jeff and B saw so many beautiful, colorful varieties and wanted to give them a try. Th...
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For those of you who have been reading this blog for a long time, you have seen plenty of blueberry posts here over the years. (At one point my blog banner even had a picture of blueberries across the top, remember that?) There was a time when our family went blueberry picking many times throughout the summer. I remember Jeff and I milking goats and finishing animal care in the early mornings to drive to the blueberry fields and start picking before the heat of the day set in. That was before B was born. After that, I wore B in the baby carrier while we picked. Such good memories. When I think about blueberry picking, I can close my eyes and feel the warm summer sun on my skin, taste the flavor of the berries bursting in my mouth, and hear the sound of berries dropping in the bucket one by one. I can hear the people near me, family or friends… picking together, laughing together. There were summers when our family wanted to pick all the blueberries we could to freeze for throughout...
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