Rain and Herbs

Justin and I attended the 25th Annual Maymont’s Herbs Galore in the Spring. Since we planted a couple of herbs in our little garden, we wanted to see what we could add to our new project. Who knew there were so many types of herbs! And I don’t mean just plain ol’ oregano, basil and chives, I’m talking about a whole family of different types of the same herb. For instance, I knew there were a few types of mint: regular, peppermint, spearmint, chocolate mint—but that’s just the tip of the iceberg. There’s apple, lime, hairy, pineapple, orange, Persian, ginger, curly, Egyptian, lavender, lemon…oh, and the list goes on…I was a deer in headlights when I came across all these herbs.

After I snapped out of it, we browsed through several vendors. Justin was tempted to buy a blueberry bush and I wanted a peach tree. But in the end, we settled on a simple dill plant…and yes, just plain ol’ dill. Perhaps we’ll get a peach tree and blueberry bush when we get the hang of this gardening thing.

We also took a rain barrel class, presented by Clean Virginia Waterways and Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay. We were hoping to actually make one together, but the class was too large, so it was more of an informative class. The speakers taught us how to use the barrel, maintain it, and what you can use the water for. The rain barrel holds 55 gallons of rainwater—which can be filled after one rainstorm.

We took it home, build a cinder block base, and set up the storm pipe over the top.

Since then, we’ve had an endless supply of water for our garden. The water pressure is lower than the faucet connected to our house, but enough to be able to use a hose to water the plants. We love watching our garden grow.