When the Garden Takes Over—A Hobby Farm Reality Check

Every year, I tell myself the same lie: “I’m just going to plant a few things this season.” A modest garden. Some tomatoes. Maybe squash. Just the essentials.

Then seed catalogs arrive, and suddenly I’m planning for pumpkins, beans, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, cantaloupe, herbs I won’t use, and five different types of lettuce that will all bolt before I touch them.

Welcome to the annual garden explosion—that magical time when your starter trays multiply, your ducks think the mulch is a snack bar, and you find a seedling in your boot.

This week at Andersen Acres, the chaos is in full bloom. The squash are already trying to crawl out of their raised bed, the cantaloupe have declared war on the onions, and the goats keep giving me judgmental side-eye from the pasture like, “You sure about this, human?”

But honestly? I love it. Every wild, weedy, bug-nibbled bit of it.

Because hobby farming isn’t about control. It’s about dancing with nature, even if you trip over a cucumber vine in the process.