The inexperienced/ reluctant gardener grows fruit and veg

With the rise in childhood obesity in recent years and the lack of cooking skills of young adults, the government has had a big push to educate children about where food comes from and how to cook it.

This is reflected in the programmes that are on Cbeebies such as Down on the farm, I can cook, Mr bloom and My world kitchen.

The trouble with these types of programmes is that they put pressure on parents to grow food with their children. Now in principle I have no problem with this at all. In fact I think it’s a really valuable life lesson to understand how much time and effort goes into growing the food that we eat so that children appreciate their food and its journey from seed to plate and don’t waste it. I also think it is a fantastic way to encourage fussy eaters to eat a wider variety of healthy foods.

So what is my problem with growing our own fruit and veg?

Well honestly, and I don’t normally admit this as it’s quite embarrassing but I am a bit of a Princess.

I don’t like getting dirty and I can’t stand bugs and creepy crawlies. My country friends mock me and call me a typical Londoner.

I appreciate beautiful gardens with flowers but I don’t want to be the one to maintain them.

If I had my way I would have fake grass and a little patch of earth where I would grow wild flowers (those ones where you just shake the seed from the box and walk off) that do not require any watering or up keep.

When my son excitedly asked me if we could buy our own seeds and grow fruit and vegetables of course I said yes with a big smile on my face saying what a fantastic idea it was and how lovely it would be to look after them together. Inside I was screaming no and mentally checking off all of the kit I would need to buy to protect myself! There is no way my hands were going anywhere near dirt without gloves. Very thick gloves!

Once over my mental hurdle we went to the shops and got seeds, pots, soil and some grow bags.

I am really proud of the fact that although dying inside I’ve managed to disguise my hatred of gardening from my son and he honestly believes that I love it.

One of his favourite things that we grew or should that be attempted to grow were pumpkins.

Unbeknown to me, we were doomed right from the start.

Quite early on in the growing process one morning we came down to find that our pumpkin plant had been rudely turfed out of the grow bag and half of the soil with it. When we started to replant it my hand (thankfully gloved) hit against something hard. It was a bone. A huge bone with a bit of straggly meat still attached! The bone was enormous. I’m amazed that a fox managed to drag that into my garden and burry it in a grow bag. This would be quite an unpleasant experience for anyone but it is especially bad for a vegetarian!

Anyway, we ploughed on (pun intended) with our growing attempts and showered the pumpkin plants with water and love. Lots of time went by and nothing really happened. My son was getting quite despondent and kept asking when the pumpkins would start growing.

A quick google search revealed that we probably wouldn’t ever grow a pumpkin as it turns out that pumpkins are sexed!

I didn’t even know that was possible. Apparently as luck would have it all of the pumpkins that we had planted were either all boys or all girls (I don’t even know how you would begin to sex a pumpkin) and as we didn’t have a mix of each sex there wouldn’t be any pumpkins.

That’s just my luck. I force myself to garden and the world conspires against me by ensuring that all of the seeds I planted just happened to be the same sex.

I bet if you were trying to only select one sex of seed from the packet it would be nigh on impossible yet I managed it!

I knew I should have stuck to cress!

#growing #pesterpower #gardening #Cbeebies