Your Neighbor's Garden

After a lazy start to our Saturday, we decided not to hit the farmers market for once. (The thought of coming home without produce depressed me.)

Instead, on our afternoon outing, we decided to check out Your Neighbor's Garden near 51st Street and Michigan Road.

Your Neighbor's Garden is a farm stand within a private home, and it's worth the drive if you're on the northwest side of town. Tucked away in a quiet neighborhood (look for the "produce" sign by the mailbox), Your Neighbor's Garden offers produce about as local as you can get - a few feet away, in many cases. What they can't grow, they bring in from other Indiana producers (with the exception of some California morels they had on a high shelf.)

It was a fast stop, and great for a family with two tired kids. Tucked back by the garage, the small air-conditioned shop was a treat to visit. Thick, leafy bunches of lettuce. Green onions the size of a quarter. Asparagus as thick as markers. Tomatoes just at a toddler's reach (we had a tough time convincing him they weren't "balls," his new fascination.) And, interestingly, in an age where few people trust others to write a check, the owners have an honor system if you've forgotten your checkbook or cash - simply pick up an envelope and mail your payment in!

Of course, being a parent, I love the history of the stand that I found on their Web site:

The GARDEN has been a labor of love since its beginning when it began as a
family project. When Greg (9) and Anne (12) asked me if they could have a
lemonade stand, I suggested that they could probably make more money selling the
excess vegetables from my backyard garden.

Today, they grow on 2 acres within a mile of their home. Your Neighbor's Garden is at 5224 Grandview Drive in Indianapolis (east of Michigan Road). Hours are 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday.

If you're not headed to Indy's northwest side any time soon, you can check out Your Neighbor's Garden's produce at several other farmer's markets, including Broad Ripple, Zionsville, Irvington, City Market, and 38th and Meridian.

Rain Gardens

Water runoff can be a problem with your gutters. I know I have a small problem with dirt washing out in one area of my house, despite my best attempts to stop it. Visit the Green Parent to learn more about how rain gardens might be a solution.

Weeds 19, Me 0

Gardening tip of the day: Don’t leave your onion sets in the garage when the temps get in the high 80s.

I’m not sure what happened, but my red onion sets went nuts over the last week.

Last night, I opened the paper bag to see a bizarre mess of red onion sets with 3-inch long white and yellow sprouts. Yikes. It doesn’t seem natural. So I weeded out my garden, replaced the grass and weeds that overcame my seeds and dropped the strange onion sets in the ground. If those don’t work, we’ll try again with lettuce.

Gardening doesn't seem to come as easily as it used to. It used to be I'd drop in a few plants or onion sets or lettuce seeds, and, boom, they'd just grow. This year, we're coping with a heck of a lot of work, and getting questionable results.

Beans: I clearly remember that I planted three rows of our multicolor beans, but we’re not having much luck. The first batch I’d planted resulted in two – count them, two – bean plants. The second row is faring much better but a few are getting eaten or broken. We’ll see.

Blueberries: Still alive! Though strong winds and rain knocked out about half of our flowers earlier this month, we’ve actually got pea-size (green) berries growing. We’ll see how long they last – our strawberries have already been nibbled on.

Carrots: Those rainbow carrots my daughter was so excited about are not doing so well. Of the two rows I planted, maybe four carrots are appearing (and I’m not sure that they aren’t weeds.)

Garlic: The sprouting organic garlic we planted on a whim in March is doing well. The late arrivals from Pinetree are in the ground; though half are still in the fridge holding out for fall.

Herbs: Those started from seed went nowhere. (Oregano, chives and basil are no-go.) We caved last weekend and bought several oregano and basil plants to join our rosemary plant. A coworker also shared two mint plants, which are now happily potted. We’ll see how they progress.

Lettuce: About half of what I planted actually sprouted. Not sure why.

Leeks: My poor leeks that were doing so well in the peat pellets don’t seem to have survived the real world. We’re down to one lonely leek hiding in the corner of my raised bed.

Onions: Growing like crazy. We’ll see what happens with the freakish red onions with the yellow tails.

Shallots: Sprouting and in the ground. Leftovers were shared.

Strawberries: About 1/8” high in my peat pellets, but the 3-year-old ones in the ground are going like crazy. We harvested our first berries two weeks ago.

Squash: Despite two of my plants literally disappearing the night we planted them(?) the remaining three are actually growing.

Tomatoes: Our plants are faring well overall, though we had two unceremoniously snapped at the base (despite having cages). Thankfully, the Greenwood Farmers Market is selling their heirloom tomatoes at $2 each – much better than what you’ll pay for a “regular” tomato at Lowe’s!

Gardening is certainly a work in progress. Thankfully I have two friendly helpers to keep it going - or, at least, interesting!

The best gifts

Tuesday was my husband's birthday. Since we've had kids, our celebrations have keyed down considerably. Dates out to restaurants, movies, concerts or events have been replaced by simple hopes of having both kids asleep by 10 p.m.

This year was about as low-key as you can get. My husband, after a busy day of chasing children, decided to make dinner - cooking is an outlet for him - while the kids worked on their present.

The words say it all:

When life hands you lemons

Two children and a grocery store are a bad combination. Long story short, the frazzled feeling we felt Saturday by the time we hit the produce aisle meant we had a big shopping boo-boo.

"Hey, the lemons are only $1 cheaper for a bag, instead of just buying 3," I said, putting a bag in my cart.

He heard: "Buy more lemons."

Unpacking our bags, we found out we were blessed with about a dozen lemons to eat. That's a lot of ice tea. Or candied lemons if I was feeling really motivated.

Instead, we turned to yet another overdue library book and found a recipe for Ginger-Lemon Ice. It takes a few hours but is worth the wait.

Essentially it's this: Take 8 lemons and whack the tops off. (And this is why I'm not a cookbook writer...)

Scoop out the insides of the lemon, and save the pulp and juice.

Take a couple of egg whites and beat a little in a bowl. Roll the lemon "cups" in sugar and freeze for an hour or so.

In a saucepan, cook 1 cup sugar, 1/2 cup Splenda (or 1 1/2 cups sugar); 2 cups water; and a 2-inch piece of ginger, peeled and sliced. Dissolve sugar/Splenda and simmer. Take off heat and cover. Cool in the fridge. (At least 1 hour).

When cool, pour mixture into blender with pulp and juice as well as ice. Blend until the mixture is slushy. Pour into the lemon cups and serve.

The cookbook version is oh-so pretty. Reality is not. And it comes in the size of a 3 year old who wanted nothing more than to help. We had a sugar-encrusted kid. Sugar-encrusted cabinets. Sugar-encrusted sofa. Not-so-sugar encrusted lemon cups.

It was simple. It was messy. And the results are fabulous.

Need other sweet treats that don't require an ice cream maker? Try our kid-friendly recipe for strawberry ice cream.