A green thumb triumph

This spring I was so excited to finally have a balcony on which to grow herbs and a few other plants. Now I have never had a green thumb mind you, but I love fresh tomatoes on a hot summer day and fresh herbs to cut into pretty much everything I cook in the summer. So, at the first sign of warmer weather (which was about mid-May) the hubby and I raced over to Lowes and used the rest of our leftover Christmas gift card from my amazing aunt and uncle and bought two pepper plants, an early girl tomato plant, oregano and basil. I also had organic seeds for oregano, basil and thyme since my freshman year of college (I told you balcony gardening has been a dream of mine for quite a while now) and planted those in some potting soil that we bought.

Photo by Amber Bailey Duncan 

At our wedding I loved the idea of decorating with herbs that could be used again after the wonderful day, however, after a few weeks out in the southern sun at my mother-in-law's house all my herbs died. What I gained from this? All of the adorable pots I used to decorate at my wedding! Those were then used for my 4 year old seeds and newly purchased potting soil.

After several weeks of bringing in my young plantlings every night because of cold snaps that seemed endless, the warm weather was finally here to stay and my little seeds sprung and my young plants blossomed. Last week we got our first blooms on our pepper plant and now we have two peppers growing! They grow so much bigger every day. I am so particular and attentive to watering them. I need them to succeed. My husband, however is not quite as attentive. My oregano was scorched on a particularly hot day when hubby forgot to water them. I now have a whole tub of dried oregano though! Earlier this week we also saw our first blooms on our tomato plant. I was so excited. All of the recipes with fresh tomatoes have been brewing in my mind since early May. Get ready. Gardening out here is so much easier. The hottest it gets is mid-80s and the lowest lately is around 51. My plants are loving it, and so am I.