My Garden

Ever since we moved into our new house a couple of years ago, my dad has sparked an interest in gardening. With his stressful days at work as an engineer and a realtor as a side job, things can get really hectic. So I guess this was just a way to relax and calm down, while still being productive- similar to how I craft and paint my nails to calm myself down. It's quite nice to see all the beautiful and colorful flowers all over our house. I just love walking around outside and observing how the flowers and vegetables (we have a vegetable garden in the back) are doing. 

So while they were still fresh, I decided to take a couple of pictures of the flowers:

These are just a few out of the many we have. I made sure to snag a picture of those purple flowers on the top right corner especially for my mom since she really loves those. Unfortunately, the daisies died and the white flowers on the left-hand corner (along with some other flowers) were eaten by some invasive Japanese Beetles that are common in our neighborhood. 

You know, after some tough research about pesticides for my huge paper in my English class, I grew to be very against using harmful chemical pesticides. The other day I saw my dad spraying a whole bottle of pesticides and I felt horrible. Who knows how that's affecting the plants and other species besides the beetles? What if beneficial bugs are dying as well?

But then again, the beetles are beetles and they're killing the plants we tried to hard to grow. 

I wish we could use other alternatives- like spraying oil on the plants or something. From my research I've learned that most oils remove a neurotransmitter from bugs' bodies, causing them to spasm and die. I guess that's a better solution than using pesticides, but it's not as efficient either. 

Well, I just wanted to share my thoughts and ideas with you all. 

Have you been gardening lately? I'd love to see what you've grown. :)

-H.