It all started on a shopping trip to Stuttgart. We were at the Manufactum store there. It’s a store for high-end household goods using traditional manufacturing methods and materials. We always go there to look at all the stuff we can’t afford. It’s the way we roll! We were browsing their gardening stuff because I had been dreaming of a little herb garden, and picked up a couple of seeds: basil, thyme, oregano, parsley, chive and lovage, plus some tomato seeds.I say “little herb garden” and I totally meant that back then, but the whole garden thing kind of escalated quickly … I was feeling bored and lonely at that time and welcomed the intellectual challenge of learning something that was new to me. I started reading up a lot about herbs, how to care for them and the different ways to use them!We don’t have that much space on our terrace, so we had to device ways to accommodate the plants and still leave room for us to spent time outside. We bought a planting table as well as plant stands and a hanging basket. (I found them scanning the Aldi and Lidl websites for cheap alternatives to the garden center stuff.) When you have little space, you have to go vertical!As you can see, we still had lots of room to sit on the terrace and enjoy spring and summer!Of course, at this point it wasn’t a “little herb garden” anymore. I used seed bombs containing cornflowers, calendulas and more to attract bees and bumblebees. They are so much fun but they aren’t suitable for my little planters – they nearly broke them!I also picked up strawberry plants at the supermarket. Honestly, I didn’t expect much there, but they produced strawberries over the entire summer!My tomatoes totally spiralled out of control, though. I had over ten plants that grew so insanely big they basically too over the entire terrace! Next year I’ll just keep three or four plants and give away the rest of them.I also grew different peppers from seed, which made Phil really happy. He loves using them for cooking! It was amazing to be able to use homegrown herbs and vegetables in the kitchen in general. Even simple meals just taste so much better!I made a lot of rookie mistakes – ask me about the Great Fungi Disaster of 2018 that befell my yellow raspberry and the cilantro (RIP). You live and learn! At the same time, gardening gave me so much joy and calm. Right now, we’re winding down and starting to prepare for the winter. I want to hibernate some of the herbs and the other plants. I have basically no idea how to do that, but I’ll figure it out eventually …