I was raised in the surburbs and missed out on that stuff, MY grandparents, however, were good country folk, Paternal Papa was an oil man and getting up early to go ck the oil tanks was a big thrill, his garden was a missmash of what small plot he prepped and seeds he threw in there-boy what a treasure hunt! Maternal Grandma (who had the prettiest flowerbeds, yard, and houseplants) saved her rain water (which she strained and added plant food before storing for the dry season), had two trash cans-one for the dump-one she burned daily (big thrill to be big enough to burn the trash), lots of shelling and shucking, and coring and canning, which was fun with her. She only went to town on Wed for groceries, and visiting the sick. Maternal Papa never went anywhere except once a month to the dump (in his scout) and hunting. He was a big fisherman/hunter. They all gave me a glimpse of a different life, then I married my sweet hubby who lived it, and shared country living (pure, healthy, self-reliant) with our kids. Good memories on both sides-then and now. My kids love to retell animal, farming experiences. Life is good. CJ

It was 1957 and we lived in Indianapolis where Daddy was stationed with the Army. We always had flower beds with roses, daisies, ferns, coreopsis, petunias, four o'clocks, nasturtiums and a zillion marigolds, but I was ignorant of how they got there. One day I watched my mother turn over a little plot of earth in the back yard and plant it with beans, tomatoes, strawberries and cucumbers. When I asked her why she was doing that, she said she was going to grow vegetables for us to eat, and I was amazed. That's my first garden memory. Cheryl

I was in the suburbs of the desert outside of Los Angeles. I remember collecting plants in the foothills above the desert with my mom. A common Rock flower(CA native red salvia) was my first true love.I think I was about 6 or so. My mother loved roses and I loved wildflowers as a kid. As I grew older I forgot that I loved wildflowers and was growing cultivated hybrids for the most part. I moved to TX and read all about LBJohnson. I fell in love with wildflowers all over again. PJ

one of my first memories of the garden is planting onions by poking a hole with my finger in the row that daddy had just plowed with a horse and then my favorite memory is digging 'tators!!! i guess that is when i started to love playing in the dirt! my least favorite memories is shelling peas and canning them without AC in the house boy that kitchen would get hot while the stove was cooking the jars of peas. by the way i/m 54 but we were raised country style!!1

There used to be some baby pictures of my mother holding me up in the japonicas (flowering quinces) & then in the bluebonnets on "the boulevard" close to our house.

The boulevard was neat;
there was a wide grassy median between eastbound & westbound traffic lanes, planted with flowering quinces & cedar trees.

When the bluebonnets appeared (surprise!), it became a tradition for people to take baby pictures out there.

I remember watching Mr Jurgens & his mules plowing gardens in the little town where we lived.

He was in great demand;
if you had Mr Jurgens & his mules plow your garden, honey, you had arrived!

My first garden memory ('bout 4yrs old) is of the pretty tulips our elderly neighbor grew along her house. I harvested every one of the flowers before she had a chance to see them! My next memory is of huge peonies my mother grew and the big black ants always on them--no harvesting here. And my grandmother's strange cleome and her fragrant lilac bouquets, sweet violets, lilly-of-the-valley, jack-in-the-pulpits, bleeding hearts. I also remember going wild berry picking (strawberries, blackberries, elderberries) with my Gram and then black walnut gathering and the best--sassafrass root, then wild seed pods for Thanksgiving dinner (sprayed gold and in arrangement) and wild bittersweet, then holly, evergreens, and then early Spring and forced forsythia and apple blossom branches. And sprays of Easter pussywillows and little glued-on pussywillow nubbins with long ears drawn on to decorate Easter dinner place cards. Each season had it's harvest of beauty, each special plant noted (including poison ivy and it's remedy, pink Calamine lotion)--- and wonderful priceless time with my Grandma, tramping over the fields and into the woods with a sack lunch. Cleveland (suburbs), Ohio

The memory that helped shaped my understanding of gardening involves going to our aunt's ranch in the fall to clean out her cow corral from all the (blessings) from her cattle. My dad would borrow a company flat bed and we, my brothers and I would shovel (forever it seemed): this 'mostly' dry cow (blessing). Tons of it or so it seemed to my tired 8 year old arms and hands. This is a Saturday and we would do it all day and yeh Sunday was supposed to be a day of rest but noooo we had to get all the 'blessings'off the flatbed and spread out over the 100 x 80 foot garden. This is one of the few times I looked forward to Monday's and going back to school and being able to rest my blistered hands!!!

I remember shucking corn and picking and shelling peas for mom but she would always say 'don't eat any so we have enough for everyone for suppper'. Fat chance of that ( I always loved the fresh veggies from the garden but raw peas had to be my favorite:).

Reflecting back at 50 now I realize that I knew to garden well was to have to work hard, blister hands and have an achy back and smell like doo-doo. As much as I whined about it I would do it all over again for those fresh tasty veggies that we depended on so much to stretch the food budget for a family of 9. I work smarter now ( I love to use alfalfa that smells good doesn't require a truck load of smelly 'blessings' to help the garden to flourish and still don't wear gloves (need to have the feel of the soil:) but thank my parents everyday for giving me the ethics of the fruits of your labors are well rewarded by nature, even if not by your fellow man who still in my humble opinion doesn't value the farmer and growers of our bountiful harvests as much as the rest of our essential needs or wants as a society.

Happy Growing to all and may your garden be ever fruitful and a joy to your soul as it is to mine. David

My first memory of gardening was weeding the onions when I was 5 years old (and that was 56 years ago). Even a five year old can tell an onion from a weed! I worked in our vegetable garden with my daddy, and as I grew older I graduated to planting, weeding other crops, and finally harvesting. We lived next to my paternal grandparents, and daddy and grandpa shared a huge garden. When grandpa passed on, we kept the garden the same size, and shared with grandma (a Southern lady who did not work in the sun!). For my 10th birthday, I received my very own rose bush, and was thrilled! Isn't it wonderful how many people have lovely memories of gardening, and how the scent of a flower or the taste of a vegetable can summon up such happiness?

We moved from one rent house to another with no land until I was 8. That year Dad planted a garden and the only plant I remember were the carrots, 'cause all 6 of us kids would pull them up to see if there was any orange on the bottoms!

Hitexplanter - loved the story about your cow "blessings"!

We lived in the city, but my grandparents had a farm in New Mexico - they had moved there from Florida bringing all their belongings on a covered wagon. They never had running water - just an outside-type faucet over a bucket in the kitchen complete with a ladle for a quick sip of water - amazing none of us ever got sick, isn't it? There was no sink, or even cabinets for that matter --just shelves, but the dinners she cooked for our large family were wonderful (of course, clean-up took as long as meal prep, requiring the heating of gallons of water on top of the stove for washing and rinsing.) We always washed our feet at night before going to bed and baths were a weekly occurrence in a galvanized tub in the kitchen. (requiring heating even *more* water.) Oh yeah, and of course there was the outhouse out back.

I would fall asleep at night watching the lanterns of neighboring farmers as they walked up and down the irrigation ditches carrying their lanterns (not flashlights).

My earliest memories are of playing hide-and-seek in the small corn field - and all the trouble we got into when granny found out what we were up to. We climbed ladders and picked sour cherries off huge trees for cobblers, shucked corn and peas for freezing, and canned what seemed like hundred of quarts of peaches... All without air conditioning.

My first gardening experience was the annual rite of pulling St. Augustine out of our flowerbeds (amazing that I still like to garden, isn't it?) But I guess the gardening gene was passed on to me and I now have my own veggie garden, fruit trees, and maintain our flower beds (with lots of help from my DH).

My grandparents were born in the late 1800's and me? I'm 54. Amazing the progress in a couple of generations, isn't it?

Hey, this has been a wonderful thread that I have so enjoyed! Thanks, popcornhill!

My maternal grandfather came from a farming family of 14 kids. As an adult, he owned his own small business in town but he was still as self-sufficient as possible, with a big garden full of carrots, potatoes, onions, tomatoes, rhubarb, cucumbers, and who knows what else.

I remember him cutting down cardboard milk cartons to make starter planters for his tomatoes when the snow was still on the ground. He'd eventually move the tomato seedlings to a ledge in the garage in front of a window, faithfully tending to them until the ground was ready for them (quite late in WI).

My grandmother's passion was her raspberries and her roses.

I remember picking raspberries every few days with her. It was always hot and the mosquitoes were ever-present. She always made me wear a great big straw hat with a big cloth sash and I carried a metal pail. She sold pints and quarts of berries (placed in wooden containers) to several people who always came knocking every year when they saw the bushes bearing fruit.

For me, the raspberries were best eaten right there in the garden or later after my grandmother had made them into a wonderful raspberry pie.

mmmmm! berries!

We picked wild dewberries from the sides of the road, & my mother & her sister & their sister-in-law (their brother's wife) would wash them, put them in big bowls, & set them in the fridge, covered in sugar, to chill.

At supper the night they were picked, we had fresh dewberries with ice cream or with cobbler (usually peach), & then the women would can or freeze the rest.

Of course, the biggest, juiciest, most tempting sun-warm berries never made it into the kitchen-

We popped them into our mouths right there while we were picking!