Growing Your Own Lemons

Every time you turn around these days there are articles about the benefits of lemons.  Many months ago I started making lemon water for my husband.  I wrote about this in previous blogs.  http://www.thecabincountess.com/2016/01/dont-throw-away-your-lemon-peels.html  He suffered from acid reflux, and I read that lemon water helps.  People who have acid reflux and take acid reducing medicine are actually shutting down the acid receptors in their stomach,  Acid is necessary for good digestion and health.  Recently these medicines have been linked to kidney problems and other side effects.  We decided to try to get off the acid reducing pills.  The drink I make is easy.  I just buy organic lemons.  I peel them and cut them up in slices.  The seeds come out easily slicing them this way.  Next I put about three of them in my high speed blender with one peeled orange.  I add 4 -5 cups of filtered water and blend for a couple minutes.  This is like juicing, but you are also getting the benefits of the fiber.  I also wrote about making raw lemonade (http://www.thecabincountess.com/2016/01/raw-lemonade.html) and an electrolyte drink  (http://www.thecabincountess.com/2015/02/home-made-electrolyte-drink.html).  It is about the same recipe without the honey or salt.  The added orange takes a little of the sourness away.  Within a short a amount of time my husband was able to discontinue the pills completely and now he very seldom has a problem.  He warms a cup of prepared lemon water every morning and drinks it first thing.   There are many theories as to why lemon water works.  Some of them don't make sense if you aren't a scientist, but it works for him.

Last winter I planted some of the seeds in a little flower pot.  Apparently they germinate easily because now I have a bunch of plants to re-pot.  If I lived in the south I could plant these plants outside, but I will have to settle for indoor plants.  Hopefully I can actually grow my own lemons eventually.  I saw this method on Facebook recently.  http://theheartysoul.com/growing-lemons/?t=DA&W=BEN

These lemon plants must be easy to grow.  Recently I went out with some compost.  I throw all the lemons seeds in my compost bin.  This is what I saw.  There are tons of little lemon plants growing in my compost.  I know they won't make it through the winter, and I won't be able to re-pot them but it was fun to see.

I have friends who have been very successful growing their own lemons.  Stay tuned, and we shall see if I can also produce some.