I’ve wanted a vegetable garden forever. But shaded yards and/or deer were unfortunate, but good arguments against even trying. Until now …

There are currently six tomatoes ripening on the vine, but the very first one made itself known on April 3rd …

when it was all of about one inch.

Initially I thought I would appliqué a tomato patch (ha!) using this sheer cotton skirt cloth …

but then my eyes caught on the golden stripe that was a dead ringer for the 1/4″ dowel in the original picture.

So I went with it, adding a bit of Inktense to make the tomato and leaf stand out from the background. But mindful of Annick’s question about washability, I decided to give the finished patch a good soak and see what would happen …

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And while it’s true that the excess dye did get blotted, it did not bleed into the adjoining cloth.

Phew!