Potato Time

Perhaps I should rename this blog to something about gardening. It seems that's all I ever post about.  We do other things around our house too, like vacuum and cook, but gardening seems to be the most exciting! ;)

Today we planted potatoes (yes, on February 3--too cool or warm :).  I am so so excited about this!  We tried growing some last year but got started too late in the season and didn't get a great yield.  I'm hoping this year will be better.  I planted some in my raised bed and will also do the grow bags too.  Above you can see how I mounded the dirt to one side of the box.  I planted the potatoes on the lower flat side.  As they grow I can use the soil mounded up to toss back on the plants and bury them again.  For those of you not familiar with growing potatoes, that is called hilling.  As in, you make a hill on top of the potato plants.  Potatoes don't grow any tubers below the level of their seed potato, so you have to mound up the dirt on the plant to get more than just a few potatoes.  Always keep any surface spuds covered with dirt or mulch to protect them from the sun.

The thing that was the most fun about this planting, though, was how excited Ben was about it.  Follow this LINK for a video of Ben planting potatoes.  I have very fond memories of following my parents down the row with pieces of potato to drop in the holes they dug.  And I got to do it today with my boy.  Aaa!  I love it :).