Basil My Way

When I couldn’t readily find organic basil plants, I planted my own organic seeds (that I happily came across at a big box store); now they’re up and growing well! I suppose I can move the “garden sculptures” back into their places throughout the garden since the seeds are now no longer potential bird food. I’m not yet seeing any bursts of growth from last week’s fertilizer application. Gardening requires—and builds patience. My computer is acting up so if you don’t see any posts—pray for it to work again. Don’t give up on me, Lord willing, I’ll be back soon.

Doing Instead of Dreading

Ah, it feels good to sit down in the garden! I’ve just finally fertilized my balcony garden-instead of dreading it, I did it. Though the fertilizer is organic, it doesn’t smell as bad this time (a mixture of things I don’t even want to read). I didn’t get around to fertilizing the pots in front; I startled a bird—a mutual feeling, when I opened the front door a few minutes ago and discovered to my dismay that it was building a nest in my hanging basket. The purple sweet potato vine and mini sun coleus were already mashed down and suffering from Mr. & Mrs. Bird’s stash of skeletonized leaves. I hated to undo their hard work but dive-bombing us any time we open or close the door or water the plants won’t do. I’m glad I discovered the plan before it was too late. I carefully placed their building materials where they could find them and start again somewhere else. I also did the dreaded red hibiscus pruning today. Hibiscuses bloom mostly on new growth—the stem ends, so I needed to make more ends to make more blooms. It was getting lanky and the one long branch caught the wind the other night and caused the plant to fall over on several other plants. It was time.

Room to Grow

My plant purchases from two weekends ago finally have bigger pots to help keep them from drying out and to give them room to grow. Lack of potting soil caused the delay. I finally got out to the largest corporation on earth, hoping to find plain potting soil. Unfortunately, every bag had fertilizer in it. I have my own, organic fertilizer—I didn’t want all that. At last, I found one that didn’t have fertilizer called “Moisture Control”. It’s supposed to keep the soil from being over or under-watered. I’m skeptical. It was all they had. We’ll see.


I potted the peppermint and a heliotrope. If you’ve ever wondered what the color fashion and interior design call heliotrope looks like—here it is, a medium violet/purple.

We had a pretty strong rare earthquake tremor here yesterday but I didn’t feel it and none of my pots look out of place, so they don’t seem to have felt it either.

What They Need to Succeed

Today is another idyllic day; it helps make my disagreeable task less so. Today is fertilizer day.

When I had a yard to garden in, I’d measure out some blue stuff into my huge watering can and hose it full. Then I’d haul the heavy thing from bed to bed--an arduous task. I had adjusted the process to fit my smaller scale container gardens but an (indoor) incident a few years ago caused me to be chemically sensitive. Now I use only organic fertilizer.

I like to buy it from the 100 year old+ hardware store in a nearby small town. Shopping there is always a pleasant adventure so I like to keep the tradition going by supporting them. Besides, I couldn’t find any organic fertilizer anywhere else so I asked at the farmer’s market…

The fertilizer is a powdered mix of things that I don’t even want to know about but I know the plants need it, so I get it for them. It’s not that I’m looking to have big, fat, bushy, record-setting everything, I just want them to succeed at what they’re made for. If they’re flowering plants, I want them to flower well. If their main purpose is to display colorful leaves with attractive markings then that’s what I expect them to do. But they have to have what they need.

In the same way, Jesus expects his followers to do what they are created to do—live a godly life. Living a godly life isn’t only for spiritual giants; it’s the simple, basic, norm. And he has given his follower everything they need to succeed.

“His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness.” 2 Peter 1:3