Corn, Corn and More Corn

Okay, is everyone ready? So I started out the day with a bit of an obstacle, I needed to clear a space to put my corn. As I had already planted some corn earlier to the right of the palm tree you can see in the photo, I decided that the croton to the left of the palm would have to go, to make way for some more. And it took me all day. First off, I couldn't find my gardening gloves. Where are my gloves??? There are not a million different places they could be, I use them for gardening and that's it. I do have a terrible habit of putting them down in different places, but I usually find them pretty quickly. But no, no luck. And gardening without gloves is not fun. I don't like touching the dirt, I am grossed out by bugs, I hate getting my fingernails all dirty, and I have a super low pain threshold.

But I am stubborn and off I went with no gloves, sawing and chopping away at the croton trunk like a champion. I'd stop every five minutes to go look for them, but no... I just couldn't find them. The sawing was no fun and I started using the shovel like an axe, chipping away at the trunk, and finally... it gave way. I felt a bit bad for the croton, it certainly wasn't a clean death, but a quick dig up of all the weeds, and hey presto, a corn patch!
Now I know the area only looks tiny, but there is space behind the palm too, and there is room for a good 20 plants there. And I am trying to keep the words of Jackie French in mind, and plant nice and thickly.

So yesterday I promised that we would do this by the book, but... I didn't. I had planned to plant in neat little rows, interspersing the corn with the beans, but after hacking away at the croton (for all you of who think I am a wimp I should have taken a photo, the trunk was super thick, I couldn't fit my two hands around it) I was tired and I just wanted the corn in there.

So... no neat rows. I just sprinkled the corn and bean seeds on the soil, covered them up, watered them in and am crossing my fingers. I put some cucumber in there too because I had read that it's also a companion to corn.

I am curious to see how this turns out.

And I do promise that one day we'll plant things out properly in rows!