THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 12, 1994 TAG: 9406100191
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Mary Reid Barrow
DATELINE: 940612 LENGTH: Medium
All she needs to get the same effect is to tend her family's huge vegetable garden down on Blackwater Road.
{REST} ``I tell you, all the ladies that go to the tanning booth and to exercise,'' James said, ``well, you can get all the suntan and exercise you need out here a-hoeing and chopping.''
James, a Kempsville resident, was looking out over her own special country spa. In addition to a nice tan and strong muscles, she also has 75 rows, each 235 feet long, of lush green produce to show for her efforts.
James is a free-lance tour guide for bus companies and makes crafts that she sells at craft shows. She also helps out her two daughters at their clothing boutique, Elle, on Shore Drive.
``So if you ask what else I do, I do a lot, but it's not 8 to 5 everyday,'' she said.
So James farms, too. For two years, she has been traveling down from Kempsville to hoe and chop on the plot of land in southern Virginia Beach. James, her husband Eddie and their grown children, all of whom help out too, started raising the vegetables two years ago on the property they already owned in Blackwater.
``I sleep in Kempsville,'' she said. ``I live here.''
Their goal was to raise fresh, home-grown vegetables for the family when they started. Before the summer was out, they had so many vegetables and herbs, James was sitting out by the road under an umbrella on weekends and selling produce to passersby.
``I hate to see food go to waste,'' she explained. ``When it starts to come in, it gets to be a lot.''
Last year, James had so many cocktail tomatoes that she even sold them to restaurants for their salad bars. The tomatoes were still growing in profusion last fall.
``It's time to plow these babies up,'' she told her family. ``I was sick and tired of picking cherry tomatoes.''
This year, picking season is almost upon her again. The herbs are in season now and some of the kohlrabi, peppers and squash are coming in.
``I've always had a garden,'' she explained, ``but not a g-a-a-a-rden like this.''
She waved her hand over row after row of black-eyed peas, tomatoes, watermelon, string and butter beans, cantaloupes, egg plant, snow peas, green peas, broccoli, cucumbers, corn, celery, cymlings, yellow squash and zucchini. Unusual vegetables include tomatillos, the little green tomatolike vegetables with husks, and kohlrabi, a sweet ``cabbage turnip.''
Over on the other side is a large herb garden full of basil, dill, oregano, parsley, sage, camomile and other herbs. This year, she has an abundance of horehound, the mint that is used to make horehound candy and to flavor cough drops. Herbs are picked to order for customers.
``Herbs are much better picked fresh,'' she said.
James dries the herbs that she doesn't sell in a dehydrator and bottles them to sell at craft shows. She also collects seed from sunflowers that grow throughout the garden and bags them in colorful cloth bags to sell at the shows.
Orange and yellow marigolds border the garden to help with insect control. The sunflowers are scattered about for the same reason, she said. All the herbs are grown organically and the vegetables are organic for the most part, she said.
The garden doesn't even have a name. The family is considering calling it Grapevine Farm. Three young grapevines are growing in the garden now, but the idea for the name came from the Pungo farm where Eddie James was born and raised. The farm, which used to be at Sandbridge and Princess Anne roads where a Food Lion grocery is now, was called Grapevine Ridge, James said.
James, tour guide, craftswoman and helper at a fashionable boutique, also likes the unlikely profession of a-hoeing and chopping.
``It's rewarding to plant a seed and watch it come up,'' she said. ``The butterflies and bees are buzzing around and the birds are singing. Everybody seems to be happy out here.''
To visit James' own health spa to purchase cut herbs or vegetables, call her at home, 497-5772, in the evenings to find out whether or not she'll be open and how to get there. The quantity of the harvest dictates when she'll be open, but she figures it will be most weekends.
HERBS AND POTPOURRI is the theme of tours through June at both the Moses Myers House in Norfolk and the Adam Thoroughgood House at the Beach. The focus will be on what was grown in 18th century gardens. The tours will be at 1 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays at the Myers House and in 17th century gardens at 1 p.m. on Sundays at the Thoroughgood House. The cost is $2. Call 664-6283 for reservations.
P.S. CELEBRATE FLAG DAY at 7 p.m. Tuesday, June 14, with a patriotic concert on the lawn of the historic Francis Land House. The Navy Atlantic Fleet Brass Quintet will play. The concert is free and participants should bring a blanket or lawn chairs for seating.
by CNB