The last time we had a garden was in 2015. That was the year we left Illinois for Texas, where I thought we would garden again. The Texas garden never happened and when we made the decision to move back to Illinois, we vowed we would garden again.

Less than one year after moving back, hubby began the process of building raised beds. I planned out the basic design and by May we were putting plants and seeds in the beds. Our 2024 garden became reality.

With finger crossed, we hoped to have at least a little bit of success and at times I have felt like we may have bitten off more than we can chew. I decided to try growing things I have never grown before like blackberries, blueberries, raspberries and butternut squash. I just have to remind myself that gardening is trial and error. We try to grow things and hopefully learn something from the experience.

Currently, we have 9 tomato plants and every day I find more new tomatoes.

The raspberries already have little green berries on them which means I need to get them covered soon to avoid having the birds eat them.

The blackberry bush is growing in a large pot, but not showing signs of producing anything. Honestly, I didn’t expect it to and have decided to have hubby build another raised bed this fall and will move it to the raised bed.

The blueberries are also in pots, and I’ve already decided to transplant them into one of the beds this fall. The soil needs more amending and I’m hoping they’ll be happier with a bit more room.

The strawberries are doing very well. We picked one tiny ripe strawberry a few days ago and it was yummy. Now I have a couple others that are blooming. Next year will be better and I am hopeful that in a couple years we’ll get a nice crop of strawberries to eat.

Two of the serrano pepper plants look good and one is slow to grow. The plants can produce A LOT of peppers, so if only 1 or 2 produce, we’ll be find with that.

The jalapeno’s are blooming and I’m hoping to see some peppers soon.

We have one lone bell pepper hanging out and some new blooms.

I planted two zucchini plants, but one didn’t survive. I decided to put a seed in the ground a few weeks ago and it’s looking pretty good.

I also put two butternut squash plants in the ground. Neither of them did well, so I eventually pulled them and decided to put seeds in the ground to see what would happen. One sprouted pretty quickly while the other did not, so I planted two more seeds. Low and behold, three butternut squash plants emerged. I pulled two and am now watching the other grow. Hopefully I didn’t put them in too late and we’ll have some yummy squash to eat later this summer.

The real trial was planting asparagus in a raised bed. It is a large deep bed and while a couple of them appear to have died, the rest have nice green foliage. We’ll add another deep layer of soil this fall and see what we get next spring.

The onions are looking good. I plan to try and grow a second crop this fall.

We have one bed that is empty. I will put in a couple fall crops just because I can.

Because I thought it would be fun, I got a lemon tree and a banana plant. They are both living in pots outside where it’s nice and warm (actually hot right now). The banana tree keeps getting new leaves and with the heat and humidity right now, I think it’s happy. The lemon tree lost a few leaves and buds after I put it outside, but now it’s getting new leaves and today has a new little white bud. Both of these will come back into the house this fall to wait out winter.

One other thing we planted in a pot this year is a Tamarillo. I had never heard of this before, but hubby saw them online and wanted to try it out. I was worried about it because it wasn’t looking good when I moved it outside, but now it has a lot of leaves and flowers.

Because one of the kids requested we grow carrots, we have a small bed specifically for carrots. I had only tried to grow carrots one other time unsuccessfully. This time, I worked to get the soil as light and fluffy as possible. The two littles helped me put the seeds in the ground and we currently have 26 carrots growing. Hopefully the soil is fluffy enough that we will get some nice carrots to eat.

While I don’t yet know how successful our 2024 garden will be, I’m pleased with how well things are growing so far.