Raising My Jumbo Tomatoes From Spain

   I have this fabulous piano teacher, who lives in Spain. We meet on Skype, and have a great, and sometime hilarious time during our lessons. She also has a seed business, and she sent me some for my birthday. I'm not too good and gardening, but I decided I was going to try to raise some tomatoes this year! We start ours inside so they have a better chance to live, but I got started a little late. My plants are just now producing their best.

   That little green plant in the jar is a celery stub. Nobody believed that B could get that thing to grow into a plant, but it did!

   You might be wondering why there is plastic wrap over the pots. It's called the Mini Greenhouse Method (I actually made that up!). It helps the keep warm if your hundred year old house is regularly 65 degrees because of drafts and "saving money." It also quickens the growing process if are a bit last minute (like me).
   After a few weeks, I planted them outside. However, they just didn't seem to be growing. I sadly said goodbye to them when we went to stay at our family farm for a month. I didn't think they would survive even though I surrounded them in straw and installed 6 inches of rich compost below them. I also stuck some cute little tomato cages on top of them and a mini wire fence to keep out the balls (obviously no longer visible in the picture below). So, I did have some hope.
   My parents came back two weeks in to check on everything, and they said that my tomato plants where only 1 foot tall. Well, at least they were alive! But when we came back from our trip, they were freakin' bushes!
   They became so enormous in a few more weeks that I had to make a web-nest for them out of rope and conduit pipes. Talk about ghetto gardening! They soon grew over that and dominated quite a section of our inner-city half yard.

   At first I didn't think they would produce to many tomatoes, until one day I saw a biggie poking out. He was followed by another, and another and quite a few beauties!