10 things I've learned about gardening in our first year

1. Weeds suck - especially stinging nettles.  Hopefully, this won't be as much of an issue next year, as we're trying to kill them off this fall.

2.  Tomatoes from your own garden taste TOTALLY different from those you get from the grocery store.  They aren't even from the same planet.  As someone who has always hated plain tomatoes, I learned that I ADORE garden tomatoes.  They are awesome!

3. It's important to spread out your plantings and to plant successively.  Otherwise you end up with three bags of potatoes that you need to eat all at once.  And you get one harvest of carrots, etc.

4. I need to be more creative in using/preserving our harvest.  I was unprepared for the volume this year and you can only make so much zucchini bread and give it away before people stop taking it! Next year, I need to be prepared to can/dehydrate/etc to keep the produce around longer.

5. Gardening requires patience.  I don't have that.  This makes gardening hard.

6. Courgette/Zucchini plants get HUGE! They will take over your whole garden if you let them.  Planning for this space is essential.

7. Gardening gives you an excuse to be outside when it's nice out.

8. Growing stuff from seed is hard - especially if you manage to get them outside and you have huge frost in May, right after you put them out.  But it's fun and rewarding and I'll try it again next year.

9. Fresh herbs rock! They make your food taste so much better.  A dish that was completely bland with dry herbs is amazing with fresh ones.  Once you grow fresh herbs, it's hard to go back.  And when you have them fresh, you spice up every dish.

10.  Gardening is fun, rewarding and it's a really great feeling to eat something that you grew and cooked with your bare hands from seed/plant all the way through!