Gardening is a kind of magic...

I've recently rediscovered the magic of growing things. And it really is a kind of magic. You get these tiny seeds and you put them in the dirt, water them daily and amazingly, tiny green sprouts appear! And not only that, they grow into bigger plants! Some even become trees!

To me it's far more astounding than the "miracle of life" that people consider human births to be. I've studied the science. Animal life isn't that mysterious. Plants, however, that's what I would call the miracle.

I used to grow things as a kid in our backyard. I can remember managing to grow baby carrots successfully, and parsley. And about eight years ago or so, I had some amazing sunflowers that grew to over 5" tall. We tried saving the seeds to grow more when they died, but nothing came of it.

But this time, after buying some supermarket seed packets on a whim, I've gotten excited about gardening again, and they're actually not dying (the key is to remember to water them).

So starting off with some cherry tomatoes, basil and chives, I planted the seeds in some seedling trays. Since then I've lost the first batch of basil but planted the tomatoes in the ground and moved the chives to a spare parch in the tressle pot with the parsley (my mums efforts). I've also added a pumpkin seedling (one of four i bought, the only survivor), and some strawberries donated by my brothers girlfriend. Now I've also started drying out some more pumpkin seeds from a store pumpkin, with plans to plant some garlic and mint. Fingers crossed it all works out.