This is part of our 100 Things in 2015 challenge. Here’s the full list.

We love to eat plants, and it would make a ton of sense for us to grow our own. We’ve all tried gardening living in other houses, but our Portland house didn’t lend itself very well to this kind of thing, so it took us a few years to get up the gumption to do it.

We bought a giant half-barrel, and Phoebe contributed a couple of strawberry pots. Then we took the kids to Garden Fever to choose some plants. They both picked an interesting mix of strawberry varieties, tomatoes, lettuce, and some decoratives as well. Then it was time for planting.

Our harvest was…modest, but tasty. We’re just not very good gardeners, and this year’s summer was scorching right when we were traveling. Our tomatoes are still bearing maybe four cherry-sized ones every week, but the strawberries didn’t do so well after the first couple of weeks.

Still, it was a fun experiment. We had a good time putting it all together, and watching things grow is always cool. We’ll probably do something similar in our next house, too!