• Name: April McGuire
• Location: Johnson City, TN
• Gardening experience: I'm a serious hobbyist
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I grew up on a dairy farm and my Daddy always had a large garden.  When I got married and started buying food at the grocery store I was grossed out by the mealy tomatoes.  After all, I'd been spoiled for all my life by fresh tomatoes right off the vine!  So, my husband built me a raised garden and my Daddy helped load and haul rich cow pooped dirt from his pasture field.  I started with one bed and the next year added another.  I currently have two 9x20 beds, not approximate measurements, but you get the gist.  And have a dedicated herb garden started that should be finished in 2012.  I would have a whole acre if we could dig where I live, but we live on shale and there is barely any topsoil. 

I started out gardening like my Daddy, using Seven dust and Miracle Gro.  Then I got pregnant, had a child and we got feral honeybees.  Now I use organic methods as much as possible. I've also seen tremendous benefits in companion planting and catering to beneficial insects.  Any chance I get I influence my Daddy to garden organically too, but he is pretty headstrong and likes to do things his own way. Our garden and yard are surrounded by woods and it gets wilder and woolier every year as the good and bad bugs fight it out. 

I garden with my whole heart and soul, from spring until fall I am knee deep in everything garden related.  We plant our seeds in January.  Put most everything in the ground by late May and spend the rest of the time on a million little garden tasks.  Then comes canning and freezing and drying.  By November I welcome the cold and a break from the work and fast pace of it all.  After a few months off, I'm ready to go again. 

If I'm ever unable to get out and work in my garden I hope I'm a very old woman and out of my mind.  Otherwise I'd rather die and go on to Gods heaven!