Home and Garden Friday - I'm All 'Choked' Up!

Let me start of by saying the following -

• I am not the world's greatest gardener. Not even close. I'm just too dumb or stubborn to stop.
• I am TERRIBLE at labeling what plants are in what pots. I say I'll remember and I'll write it down. Nah...doesn't happen. 

So...

Last fall, a friend of Foxy's gifted me with some garlic he had grown himself. In my infinite wisdom I grabbed an 'empty' pot and decided to grow them in a container. Mainly because I was too lazy to talk around to the back of the house and put it in with the other garlic. Also, I wanted to know which garlic was his. 

And all through the fall and into our weird winter, my little garlic cloves grew and grew, looking absolutely gorgeous. I was so proud of it and told it so on numerous occasions in and out of the house (it's beside my front walkway). 

Then spring came along. And some additional weird weather. From snow one day to 80 degrees the next. Go figure. 

I was in the process of growing several things for my garden and to show at a program I was giving on herbs this month. I noticed in my 'garlic' pot something was growing along with the garlic. In my stupor of too much gardening and too little time, I couldn't remember if I had maybe thrown some calendula seed in there and forgot about it. Wouldn't surprise me.

But then it kept growing past the time it should look like calendula. 

And then it hit me!

Even though I swear I thought I had gotten rid of every little piece of Jerusalem artichokes a friend had given me last year...

Well, it seems I didn't do a good a job as I thought. I have this small pot filled to the brim with Sunchokes! And I have no one to blame but myself.

You see, last year I had them in a 5 gallon bucket and had sat the bucket in my herb garden. And then promptly forgot to care for it. I forgot to water it. Talk to it. In other words, if it was an animal or human, I would probably be in jail right now. 

I wasn't really invested in the 'chokes. I really just wanted the flowers. And due to my neglect, it really didn't happen. Now, because I had the garlic in there, it was getting love and attention - thriving like nobody's business. 

Sigh...

So now I am going to have to do something with it. 

I do have an area in the back garden where the soil is really poor. And since I am looking for the flowers, not the sun chokes, I might transfer them to that area. Last year I sat my peppers on the top of the soil in pots. If I plant them there and they spread, they can only loosen up the soil there. Maybe. Hopefully.

Oh well, today's chore is to repot a ton of tomatoes and peppers so I can give some to friends and give mine a better home for the next week or so until I can get them in the ground. I'll figure out the 'chokes later.