Melissa – I can give you some help with the gardening. Go to the
library and get Mel Bartholomews All New Squarefoot Gardening. Also,
do web searches for squarefoot gardening and lasagne gardening. I
homeschool also, and my son and I have learned gardening together. He
has learned to build the gardens, design, buy and install the drip
irrigation, and loves working in the garden even if he hates most of
the veggies. He looks at it as doing what he can to support his family
in these hard times and gets a lot of pride out of his
accomplishments. Heck, so do I. Nothing tastes as good as a meal that
mostly came from my garden. I understand the black thumb. Mine is
slowly going from black to light brown. Hopefully the more I learn,
the greener it will become. Where there is a will, there is a way.
Virg