A few months ago, Julia made one of her sadly infrequent visits to story time at the library. She picked a good day to go, however, because the nice story time lady brought favors for the children: small tomato plants and corn seeds, which the kids planted in paper cups.

Being parents in possession of large, open spaces in our yard that desperately needed filling, we waited for the corn to sprout and then dutifully transplanted the seedlings into a flower box behind our bedroom. Then, learning that we couldn’t expect the corn to actually produce corn without other plants to facilitate proper pollination, we bought several more stalks and planted them, too.

The rest is history. Or, as Julia says, “My corn is getting bigger and bigger and bigger!”