Get your green thumbs going

Grow your own. It's not really hard and can be so satisfying.  When tomatoes are $5/kg and you have bushels of them on your plants you'll have a smile on your face.  You don't need to have huge garden beds and spend hours and hours in the garden. You can start with a styro foam box (ask your greengrocer, just don't tell him you're going into the grow your own business). Plant lettuces, tomatoes, carrots, strawberries, silverbeet, capsicums, eggplant, parsley, mint, chives - whatever you eat in these boxes and sit back and watch your savings grow. Visit the Gardening Tips pages in the Menber's Centre to get some expert advice on just how to get started and then jump right in, just like Deb Parker did.


 "Since I mastered the art of pot gardening last summer I have managed to keep my family (five of us) in vegetables all year. The only veggies I have bought for twelve months have been potatoes and onions.  I started with two concrete pots with tomatoes in them and have moved on. I now have 49 concrete pots of varying sizes placed around the sides of our house and each one has something growing in it. Oh, I didn't buy the pots. I looked up our council hard rubbish calendar and on the first day of each hard rubbish collection in our bordering areas I spent an hour driving around collecting pots. I haven't had to buy any. I cleaned them and painted them inside and out before planting, to help them retain the moisture. They look great and better still they are saving me money."
Deb Parker