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From the Ground Up: The Story of a First Garden
 
 

From the Ground Up: The Story of a First Garden [Kindle Edition]

Amy Stewart
5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)

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Product Description

Product Description

Amy Stewart had a simple dream. She yearned for a garden filled with colorful jumbles of vegetables and flowers. After she and her husband finished graduate school, they pulled up their Texas roots and headed west to Santa Cruz, California. With little money in their pockets, they rented a modest seaside bungalow with a small backyard. It wasn't much--a twelve-hundred-square-foot patch of land with a couple of fruit trees, and a lot of dirt. A good place to start.

From the Ground Up is Stewart's quirky, humorous chronicle of the blossoms and weeds in her first garden and the lessons she's learned the hard way. From planting seeds her great-grandmother sends to battling snails, gophers, and aphids, Stewart takes us on a tour of four seasons in her coastal garden. Confessing her sins and delighting in small triumphs, she dishes the dirt for both the novice and the experienced gardener. Along the way, she brings her quintessential California beach town to life--complete with harbor seals, monarch butterfly migrations, and an old-fashioned seaside amusement park just down the street.

Each chapter includes helpful tips alongside the engaging story of a young woman's determination to create a garden in which the plants struggle to live up to the gardener's vision.


Product details

  • Format: Kindle Edition
  • File Size: 342 KB
  • Print Length: 276 pages
  • Page Numbers Source ISBN: 0312287674
  • Publisher: Algonquin Books (19 Jan 2000)
  • Sold by: Amazon Media EU S.à r.l.
  • Language English
  • ASIN: B004OR1U2M
  • Text-to-Speech: Enabled
  • Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #480,036 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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Amy Stewart
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
Format:Hardcover
Amy Stewart tells the story of how she got to Santa Cruz & took over a patch of seaside earth on which a couple of fruit trees, a handful of shrubs & a host of weeds fought for life.

Each chapter includes helpful tips on neighborly propagation, composting, worm juice, rose pruning techniques, how to make a bug love you & concocting a gardener's bath. They are not what you think - some of this novice's results are hilarious while others are downright commonsensical. One of the first tips she gives us is on Making a Sun Map - do give it a go - I haven't looked at my garden the same since I discovered this clue.

Alongside the story of this young woman's determination to create a garden in which the plants will live up to her vision, she remembers family moments from her childhood while facing down obstinate natives more wily than her. Talk about turf wars!

A fine companion for anyone contemplating becoming addicted to gardening! Amy Stewart has since moved to northern California where she is hard at work on her second garden &, I hope, her second book.

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:  25 reviews
22 of 22 people found the following review helpful
How a gardener is born! 26 Jun 2001
By Rebecca Brown - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Hardcover
Amy Stewart tells the story of how she got to Santa Cruz & took over a patch of seaside earth in which a couple of fruit trees, a handful of shrubs & a host of weeds fought for life.

Each chapter includes helpful tips on neighborly propagation, composting, worm juice, rose pruning techniques, how to make a bug love you & concocting a gardener's bath. They are not what you think - some of this novice's results are hilarious while others are downright commonsensical. One of the first tips she gives us is on Making a Sun Map - do give it a go - I haven't looked at my garden the same since I discovered this clue.

Alongside the story of this young woman's determination to create a garden in which the plants will live up to her vision, she remembers family moments from her childhood while facing down obstinate natives more wily than her. Talk about turf wars!

A fine companion for anyone contemplating becoming addicted to gardening! Amy Stewart has since moved to northern California where she is hard at work on her second garden &, I hope, her second book.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
From dreamer to doer 13 Jan 2001
By Joann Sonenstein - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Hardcover
For those who enjoy digging in the dirt or simply admiring gardens, Amy Stewart's From the Ground Up is a charming read. The book offers many practical tips but its appeal is more than a "how to" manual. The reader shares Ms. Stewart's excitement in planting her first flowers and veggies in the ocean climate of Santa Cruz, CA, discovering the hard way what really works. The author shops for soil amendments and ladybugs the way some women revel in a Saks Fifth Avenue sale. Recipes using garden bounty pepper the narrative. The mood is like a cozy chat between friends. All this unfolds against a backdrop of a roller coaster next door, tourists stealing plants and cats gamboling in the greenery. Curl up in a comfy chair in a pleasant spot and enjoy the gardening expoeriences of Ms. Stewart from dreamer to doer.
8 of 9 people found the following review helpful
True to Heart and Place 6 April 2001
By Kelly Marine Brown - Published on Amazon.com
Format:Hardcover
Amy Stewart captures the essence of gardening and living in Santa Cruz, CA. This is a gentle and graceful book that will make you want to run to your local garden center and buy everything, then go home and spend the whole weekend getting dirty. You will greatly enjoy this book regardless of the size or state of your garden or yard. A wonderful read, very well written, almost poetic at times...you will love it.
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