My daughter and I are on vacation this week in California with my brother, sister-in-law, nephew, mother, father, step-father and step-brother. Yep, that’s my modern family. My brother and mother have always been the gardeners in the family for as far back as I can remember. As kids I would be off riding horses while my brother and mom would be tending our hugh garden on the farm. I always liked cooking, but the garden bug didn’t bite me until after college when I grew tomatoes and peppers my apartment flower bed in Los Angeles. I’ve been looking for plots of earth to plant ever since.
My brother has always had an amazing green thumb. Every house he’s owned or place he’s lived has been planted and gardened. His backyard is a vertical jungle of trees, shrubs and flowers, herbs, fruits and vines. Across the street he has rehabbed a dry strip of ground that use to be a pile of junk, into a lovely vegetable patch. Squash, peppers, beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, beets and a high fence full of grape vines grow from this rocky little rectangle. He shares the crop with the neighbors who own the property. The warm, dry California weather is perfect for these vegetables. He has a drip-line irrigation system that only delivers water to the plant. And there’s hardly a weed in sight! He makes it look so easy.