Laura Lapp - Amish Garden: A Year In The Life Of An Amish Garden

Copyright 2014 by Laura Anne Lapp

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.

Cover design by Cliff Snyder

Cover photo credit Jeremy Hess Photographers/JH

Print ISBN: 978-1-56148-792-9

Ebook ISBN: 978-1-68099-000-3

Printed in the United States of America

Publishers Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lapp, Laura Anne.

An Amish garden : a year in the life of an Amish garden / by Laura Anne Lapp ; photography by Jeremy Hess.

p. cm.

ISBN 978-1-56148-792-9

1. Gardening --American. 2. Seasons --United States. 3. Amish --Social life and customs. 4. Amish --Social life and customs --Pictorial works. 5. Amish --Pennsylvania --Lancaster County --Social life and customs --Pictorial works. I. Hess, Jeremy. II. Title.

SB451.3 .L37 2013

CONTENTS

Acknowledgments

Thank you, my five sister gardeners, for making this project possible. Without your gardens and input, this book would have been very slight.

Thank you, my three boysAiden (age five), Thomas (age three), and Micah (age two)for keeping my life interesting and being my big helpers.

Last, and most important, thank you, John, for your help, support, and patience. Youve helped me more than you know.

Laura Anne Lapp

A Word from the Publisher

In order to respect the caution which members of the Amish church have about being photographed, we have not included frontal, face-on photos of adults in this book. No photo was included in this book without the authors approval, in respect for her religious convictions.

ABOUT AN AMISH GARDEN

T his is my year-long diary of living with a garden. I didnt write a how-to manual. Instead, Ive recorded the love, the uncertainty, the hard work of growing our familys vegetables, and also the immeasurable satisfaction of preserving our food when the garden is in full swing.

I asked five other gardeners, friends and family members whose gardens and gardening skills I admire, if I could feature their gardens, along with mine, in An Amish Garden . We all garden differently, and I wanted to give a fuller picture of life with a garden than just my own.

Barbie Mom is my dear mother-in-law who lives just across the field from us and who has given me more gardening advice than anyone else. She is a true gardener who loves everything about her garden.

Esther is a friend and practically my next door neighbor. Shes older than I am and a very experienced gardener. Her gardens are the perfect oneswith straight, straight rows and no weeds. I strive to be like Esther.

Salome, my sister-in-law, lives down the road on the Lapp family home farm with her husband and six children. Salome has a gigantic garden and preserves a huge amount of food for her growing family. I always feel like Im play gardening next to her.

Winey (her nickname since childhood; her real name is Anna) is my younger sister. She lives with her husband and three boys on a small farmette where they raise miniature horses. Wineys garden is much like Esthers. I dont think Ive ever seen a weed there. Winey is very creative and loves to add interesting touches to her garden and flower beds.

Last, but definitely not least, is Becky, my other younger sister. She lives in a little ranch house with her husband and three children. Becky is the one who inspires me to start plants by seed. She does that every year and makes it look so tempting. Becky is also known for never throwing out any plants that have sprouted.

Welcome to our gardens!

Laura Anne Lapp

JANUARY

T his has been a very unusual January so far. Its the middle of the month, and we still havent had any snow or ice to speak of. I have little creeping weeds all over my flower beds.

My neighbor Esther tells me that if I had a hot bed I could be planting now. I think that would be lovely. Imagine eating fresh radishes and spring onions in January! Sure, you can buy both onions and radishes year-round, but they never taste as good as fresh out of the garden.

When the weather is like this I get really impatient for spring. Everyone knows winter isnt over yet, but its frustrating when I know its too early to do anything outside, but it feels almost warm. Im sure that when I send for my seeds and start planning the garden, the next few months will go fast.

Will six Roma tomato plantsthe plum type that work best for saucesbe way too many? Im starting my seed order, and Im trying to remember how many Roma plants I had last year. I think it was only two, and this year I want many more.

Since Ive discovered my new pizza sauce recipe, I know Ill need to can lots more than I did last year. The sauce is so delicious and so simpleits only tomatoes, salt, pepper, garlic, and oregano. It tastes exactly like a tomato fresh out of the garden. I declare you can almost taste the sunshine.

My husband John designed and built our house. While the house was built for us, an Amish family, John designed it so that it could also function as a house for an English family. The patio doors on the side piece of the house are wide enough that they could be replaced by a garage door, turning that space into a garage.