Accessible Gardening: Looking for suggestions for gardening with MS, 1 by lovemyhouse

lovemyhouse wrote:
Living in the Dallas area and choosing to garden with MS can present challenges, especially from late-June to mid-September. :-) I am very fortunate in that my MS is not progressive and relatively benign in symptoms. But, heat does me in pretty quick and ideas and/or comments on preventing or negating those effects would be a great help. I had dreams for years of what I wanted to grow at my first house and, while the dreams have evolved, I am deeply content and happy with the darts and forays and experiments and even failures in my garden. Would be even happier to find more ways to stay out there longer.

At my house, keeping out of the Texas sun means working in mid to late afternoons when that big cedar elm almost fully shades the small front and side yard (photograph from 2007). And that also means I'm working in about the hottest part of the day. Conundrum. Much has been planted that needs little or no maintenance at all in summer months. For the rest, I wear light-weight clothing, keep cold drinks handy, wash down with the garden hose periodically, only stay out for a max of an hour at a time, and only do what is essential for that day. (And also get a few of those strong young men from my office to come do the heavy digging!) Particularly wanted to hear if anyone has experience with cooling packs and if they are effective for gardening. Any other ideas to try would be appreciated...