Naturally Sidetracked

I was raised by a woman who is amazing in the garden.  She could grow so much food, tucked into a small confine, that it would feed my family and give us enough to share each year.
I then married a man, who was raised by a woman, who to this day gardens 1/2 an acre.  In fact, to her surprise, it keeps getting a little bigger each year!
I have, many a time, helped in the gardens.  I have weeded a row, or gone out to harvest a few items for dinner, I have snipped many gallons of beans to prepare them for canning.
However,  all of those things and more, left me completely clueless as to successfully growing my own garden.
Last year I tried at our rental home in Brier.  Khali harvested 3 crops of carrots, and I brought in a few salad dinners, and 3 peppers.  Our tomato plants molded in the ground toward the end of summer.  It was a might sad.
This yearI tried again to put a few things in the ground.  I killed 2 sunflowers and some chives.  The 6 strawberry transplants I was given by a friend in the spring have all successfully doubled.  I know the strawberries produced, however between the squirrels and the children, I never got anything from the plants.  I killed a few tomatoes but one, delicious heirloom variety lived and flourished!
And then became to heavy for my wimpy 3 foot wire cage and fell over.  After tying the plant to a tree to support its weight and it falling over, we staked it deeper within the ground with large sticks in teepee form, and it fell over, we gave up and let the tomato plant lay on the ground.  The plant had 3 reddish tomatoes on it today!  Unfortunately, 2 of them were nibbled on  and the last one was infested with slugs.  From the looks of it, there are plenty of  good green tomatoes on the plant that we will be picking this weekend.

It's really too bad I haven't figured out how to grow my own tomatoes yet.  Sure would make canning tomatoes much cheaper in the fall!  I am thinking perseverance and a wire caged garden would help further my efforts!