Dad's Garden

Since Brendan has been gone, I've been in charge of watering our little garden and our lawn and it has been hard work.  Our fresh herbs, zucchini, and yellow squash have been doing very well, but our tomatoes aren't in abundance as I would like.  As I was watering, I was thinking about my dad's wonderful garden back at home that he maintains year round.  A month ago when I went home to visit, I took some pictures of my dad's garden and forgot to post them.

My dad has been growing a garden since all eleven of us kids can remember.  Our grandpa also grows a garden and we always thought that was why our dad started, but we all just found out last month that my dad helped my grandpa get into gardening.  When my dad was eighteen, a coworker introduced him to gardening and he has been doing it ever since.  I'm not sure how it started, but my dad has been collecting little garden "knick knacks" I guess you would call them.  He has been getting them as gifts for Father's Day, his birthday, and Christmas for a long time now.  In fact, the black bird below was given to him by Brendan and I a few years ago.  Going back to the tomatoes, I think this is the most I have ever seen growing in his garden.  His tomato plants were nine feet high when I was home, but I've heard they've grown to eleven feet!  He has rows of lots of different varieties.  I'm not sure of everything he has growing now, but growing up he would grow potatoes, strawberries, carrots, peppers, zucchini, yellow squash,  tomatoes, cucumbers, string beans, pumpkins, ochre, spinach, lettuce, sunflowers, broccoli, and cauliflower.  I hope I can have a garden like that someday.