I’ve already shared my love for the new-fangled, brightly-coloured tomato cages that I’ve seen in the garden centres around town. What I don’t love about them, however, is the price tag. I have ten tomato plants in the garden this year, not including volunteers. At $9.99 each, that would be about a hundred bucks in tomato support I am just not willing to spend. (I’d rather buy more plants…)

I decided to mimic the effect of the painted tomato cages with my tomato stake project for the vegetable garden.

For this project you will need:

• Sturdy lengths of wood. The pieces Graham picked up for me at Home Depot are made of pine and they are about 3/4″ x 2″ by 10′. Each length makes up two stakes. Count up your tomato plants or other plants requiring staking and do the math to determine how many pieces your garden will need.

• Brightly coloured paint. I checked out the mistint section of the paint department at Home Depot first, but there was nothing bright enough for me. Instead, I grabbed these small tubes of paint from the craft aisle at Wal-Mart. They were about two dollars each, so I could try several different hues.
• A good paint brush.
• A work bench or set of saw horses to lay the wood on while painting.
• A saw for cutting the painted lengths in half.

I placed the wood on the work bench and painted each piece in a different colour. I had to let one side and edge dry before flipping them over and doing the other side and edge.

When they were dry, Graham cut the pieces in half on a diagonal to create a sharp point for driving into the ground.

Graham installed the stakes by pounding them into the ground about 4″ away from each tomato plant with a mallet.

I like the effect a lot! And I sure like the cost. The whole project came in under $25 for all ten stakes.

Other ideas for this project:

If you have children, allow them to paint the stakes, adding swirls of colour or designs on the wood. Nate is still a little bit young for this kind of involvement, but he “helped” with the installation.

Add weather-proof stickers to the stakes or stencil on shapes.

Use pretty lettering or calligraphy on each stake to indicate the variety of tomato planted at each one.

I like using stakes much better than tomato cages. I simply pinch out the suckers as the plants grow and tie them to the stakes to support the growing plants and keep the ripening fruit from the ground.

The first vegetable to be harvested from the garden this summer is (drumroll please…) the Zlata Radish!

My friend Gayla shared these yellow radish seeds with me and they were one of the first sets of seeds to be sown this spring. They germinated very well, and I only had to fill in a couple of “gaps” with some French Breakfast Radishes, which are quickly catching up to these beauties.

The Territorial Seed Company describes Zlata:

This flaxen, soft-skinned beauty comes to us from Poland. Zlata is a silky yellow, medium-sized, round to plum shaped radish with a crisp, bright white interior. Its crunchy texture and excellent, mildly spicy flavor will add zing to any relish tray or salad. Great for growing in spring and autumn, and resistant to bolting and splitting.

Radishes are one of those vegetables that I never buy in the grocery store. I only eat them when I grow them, which is most summers. They are so wonderfully peppery when fresh out of the garden, and this bunch was no exception.

I sliced them thinly and tossed them into a pasta salad I made over the weekend.

Nate, however, couldn’t wait until then to taste them.

There’s been a new addition to the garden. Well, to the yard, anyway. You might have to click on the photo below to see what I mean.

My husband’s sister’s kids have outgrown their jungle gym, so it was given to us to make use of. Graham went ahead and assembled it in the yard already because it takes up about as much space in pieces on the ground as it does all put together. True, the baby is still in my belly, but come next summer he’ll be big enough to play outside a little bit. We’ll get a baby swing attachment and when we have other family and friends come over we’ll have a place for kids to play in the yard.

I like this piece because it’s being re-used…it didn’t end up going into the garbage. It’s mostly wood instead of metal, although it does have some plastic parts. And it blends well into our yard. It completes the space, don’t you think?

This lovely little candle holder was given to me by a little friend last December. I’ve been planning to write about it ever since. This candle is holder is a great weekend gardening project you can do with your kids.

You will need:

craft glue
an assortment of seeds, beans, dried corn, etc.
an old muffin tin (one you don’t plan to use again for baking
tealight

In a plastic bowl, combine the seeds and beans. Gradually add some craft glue and stir the mixture until the glue evenly coats all the pieces. Transfer mixture to a muffin tin and press lightly so that the mixture takes on the shape of the tin.

Take a tealight and press into the surface of the seedy blob until you’ve made an indentation the same size as the tealight. Allow to dry.  White craft glue usually dries clear.

Pop the candle holder out of the muffin tin. You’re done!

This little candle looks pretty in any room of your house, and makes the perfect gift for the gardeners in your life.

My friend Katie asked me to do a guest post as a “guest expert” over at Being Savvy Toronto, so I jumped at the chance!

[C]hildren…are very often intrigued by the natural world, and generating an interest in growing plants is easy when two- to six-year old kids are steered in the direction of dirt. These tried and true methods for getting young kids into gardening are sure to help grow little green thumbs.

Head on over to read all of Three Simple Ways to Get Kids into Gardening.