Seeds of responsibility

Look at all these seeds! I should have sown many of them last spring, but they're still sitting in my basket. We'll have to wait another six months before they can be sown, and hopefully they'll still be quite viable. Yes, there's food there, but not if we don't pull our socks up and get about the duty of nurturing.

Ah, I can scold myself, but the damage is done. We're lacking in a food supply from our garden, which would be richer in nutrients than store bought produce. We could have had abundance, but now we have nothing, and we so enjoy home grown tomatoes!

Well, isn't that a fine lesson? How many times am I given responsibility but have been neglectful? How can I use this as an example to my children so they can see that there is usually plenty of opportunity to have a rich life, but distractions or laziness can make us lose sight of the longer term and more rewarding result?

So many things are parables of greater lessons and this has been just one. I really am cross with myself, but I must say that I did have that voice at the back of my head telling me that I'd regret not having done this earlier. What to do now? Well, we still can prepare the soil for other crops. Peas, silverbeet, beetroot, carrots ... I've signed up to Gardenate so I'll have regular emails sent to remind me of what to plant when.

I'm also very, very thankful that good seed and previous good crops continue to self-seed and feed us even when we haven't prepared.

Tiny silverbeet plants are emerging in the asparagus bed.  Thankfully Midgy hadn't dug these up before I found them as he's been having a great time aerating this patch.

Rhubarb is still florishing, so if we get busy, cook it up and freeze it, we'll still enjoy this before it is dormant again in the winter.  Apple and rhubarb pie, or rhubarb and rose geranium crumble .. yum!

Oca is almost ready to harvest.  We grew this in a large tub, but I'm hoping to have a new patch ready for it to go directly into the soil in July.

Our wonderful passionfruit vine had it's final innings a couple of years ago, but the root stock is coming out in a furious bid to survive.  This is actually a big problem now, as hubby and I have been trying to remove it without damaging the raspberry crop.  If anyone has any helpful tips, I'd love to hear them! 

So, in a bid to make sure I don't shirk responsibility any further, I'm going to have to allocate definite blocks of time to nurture the seeds for my garden and provide our household with the food we need.  This has been an example of 'failing to plan is planning to fail', and has certainly brought about much thought about the many other seeds of responsibility we have and often neglect.