Adventures in Gardening!

It's Spring time, which means it's time to start the garden again.  I learned a lot last year and I know I still have more to learn.  This year we added in a second raised bed.  We had bought enough wood last year for 2 beds, so we already had the wood and the black lining for another one.  My hubby put it together back in March.

Everything is planted, except for the pumpkins, we have to wait til summer time for them.  We're growing cherry tomatoes, early girl tomatoes, brandywine tomatoes, mojito mint, cilantro, oregano, spaghetti squash, pickling cucumbers, watermelon, wax beans, onions, garlic, silver queen corn, sweet corn, jalapeño peppers, cayenne peppers, banana peppers, red sail lettuce, romaine lettuce, parris island lettuce, spinach, kale, dill, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, red potatoes, and okra.  We also still have sage and rosemary from last year.  Our Strawberries came back, and of course the blackberries, blueberries, and grapes and looking great.  We even have a few raspberry canes.

Here are some pictures of all our pretty things!

I will update how the garden is doing as the growing season continues.  I am so excited for everything we are growing.

Stay tuned for my upcoming blog post about my DIY Worm Compost Bin that I am working on!!  I can't wait for my worms to get here!

Gardening Exploits

After my post I'll have a bunch of pictures for you to browse!  We made a lot of progress on the garden the last few weeks.  We bought all the wood and put it together, picked out a place and got it all set up. It took 16 bags of soil to fill that sucker!  We put some of the black cloth across the bottom to stop weeds, and we put chicken wire across the bottom too to hopefully stop moles and gophers.

I also got my half a Jack Daniels Whiskey barrel for my potatoes!  I got those planted too, waiting for them to grow.  I also got a plastic container to grow my carrots in, Aislinn helped me plant some carrot seeds too.  Those are both outside by the garden.

I did a bunch of research on square foot gardening, and then I sat down and planned out my garden using what I planned to plant, and I also looked up companion gardening to make up my list too. It took me a bit to figure out how I wanted to do it all, but I am pretty happy with what I came up with.

I bought some broccoli, cauliflower, romaine lettuce and red sail lettuce to put in the garden.  I was able to plant the Cauliflower and Broccoli today, but didn't get any pictures because it started to rain.  of course because it started to rain I was unable to plant the lettuce's or the onion bulbs that I also bought.  Hopefully I will be able to get all those in tomorrow.  Then in about a week I'll transplant my spinach and kale that I started as seeds a few weeks ago.

 Building the Frame

 Frame is done!

 Weed protector.

 Chicken Wire!

 Starting to fill it with soil.

16 bags later!

 After I put up my grid!

Close up of the grid.

 My potatoes ready to be covered with dirt!

Ready to grow!

 My sweet Aislinn, watering the carrot container.

Aislinn planting carrot seeds!

My garden plan!

I'm excited for the coming weeks.  I have a list that tells me when to plant different things for my area.  April is going to be a huge planting month for me!  I can't wait!  Anyone else starting a garden, or maybe trying out a container garden?  Are you excited to get it all started?

Garden Transplants

I already had to transplant a lot of stuff out of my greenhouse!  It's kind of crazy.

My wax beans are growing SUPER fast and at this point in time I am pretty sure that I planted them WAY to early.  It's still too cold to put them outside, we're a few weeks away from our last frost day but they are big enough to be outside LOL.  I may just have to plant new ones from seed closer to time.

I also transplanted my spinach and my kale.  I know the kale is considered a cold weather plant, I think spinach is too, but I need to double check.  If they both are they can both go outside this week along with the broccoli and cauliflower that I bought already grown some (they are both cool weather plants).

I also had to transplant my cilantro and my sage too!  The cilantro will stay in the container that it is in and will also stay indoors.  The sage will eventually be transplanted to the garden outside.  I may have planted too much sage too...oops!  On the bright side I can always see if a friend wants some for their own gardens.

Here are some pictures from a few days ago when I did the transplanting.

My wax beans the day I transplanted them.

Kale.

Spinach.

Some of my wax Beans 3 or 4 days after I transplanted them!  They are even bigger now.

I guess I forgot to take pictures of the Cilantro and the Sage, but I will be sure to get some pictures next time!

If you have started seeds, how are they doing?