The Three Sisters

The Pipsqueak is in Transitional Kindergarten, and one of the things they participated in at school was "Native American Day".  They had different stations, all geared towards learning about Native American culture.  It was an awesome day, and I wish I had pictures to share, but I don't.  I was quite busy at the facepainting station that day.  I, quite literally, had my hands full. 

Besides face painting, they had a fishing station, a dancing station, and a gardening station.  (Why didn't I get put there? Oh well!)  The gardening station had the kids putting together a mini Three Sisters Garden.

In case you're not familiar with the concept, it goes along with companion planting.  Three plants that work well together are planted in the same spot.  Corn, beans and squash.  The corn provides a stable trellis for the pole beans, and the squash vines around the ground, providing ground cover and acting as mulch for the whole bed.  They are also complimentary in that they don't rob each other of the nutrients needed. 

I was trying to figure out what to do with my fifth garden bed.  Nothing was planted in there, and then when I did plant something, my charming doggies dug it up for me.  I'm sure they were just trying to turn the soil for me, right? (Missed that one?  It's here.)

Last month, my Seeds of the Month Club* shipment included corn and squash.  I already have some beans, so I figured it was just meant to be. (The photo up top has bush beans in it - - I didn't have a pretty package for my polies.) I planted the corn this week, and once it's about knee high, I will add the beans and the squash in.  In Pennsylvania, where I lived for seven years, they had a saying about corn:  "Knee high by the fourth of July".  Not sure if that's going to be true here in Southern California, because the climate is so very different.  We'll see.  This last bed is going to be a true experiment. 

Since there's nothing to show you in my own garden, at least not yet, I thought I'd pull a photo from somewhere on the web.  I really don't feel like a blog post is a blog post without pictures.  So here:

This image can be found at: http://viettes.files.wordpress.com/2011/08/threesistersgarden.jpg
It's from the blog Viette's Views, where they had a successful 3 sisters garden in 2011. 

I'm so excited!  I'll follow up with pictures of my own once there's something to show!!!

Green thumb out!

*Doesn't the Seeds of the Month Club sound like a great idea? It's THREE BUCKS A MONTH!!!  Three bucks!  Where can you get four packets of seeds for three bucks?  If you decide to go for it, don't forget to tell them I sent you!  You do that by entering my number: CAU4IB0AZ3 into the referral code box when you sign up.  If you sign up for 6 months, I get six months free!  By spreading the word to your friends after you sign up, you'll get freebies too!