planting day....

Woohoo, the day has finally come. Yes, sirree...today is the day to get some serious veggies in the ground. Last night Mike and I laid them all out in their respective beds. This morning my mom came over and helped me plant them. We were done before lunch, thank goodness. I did plant seeds and have my radishes getting close to harvesting...hopefully! Now, with some sun, water and luck they will do their job and grow and produce. I want lots and lots of yummy veggies.

Here's an early morning picture of the garden. Every plant has been placed in a spot and is just waiting to get plopped down in the dirt to spread it's roots.

We have 16 pepper plants, so far.....hot ones and sweet ones.

We bought three kinds of squash this year, including these patty pans.

Here's one bed of tomatoes and cukes. (we have two)

Here's the squash bed...


...the pepper bed and



the full garden shot.



We have bush beans, bush pickle cucumbers, bush cucumbers, regular cucumbers, hungarian wax peppers, jalapenos, red bells, orange bells, green bells, sweet banana peppers, serrano peppers, a chocolate pepper, zucchini, yellow squash, patty pan, Mr. Stripey tomatoes, better boy, beef master, sweet 100's, yellow pear tomatoes, an orange heirloom tomato, plum tomatoes and a few other kinds of tomatoes. Also, some herbs, radishes, lettuce and carrots. Although...the lettuce looks a little....sad. We'll see. I'm hoping to bring you lots of good yummy pictures during the summer. Wish me luck!

veggie garden update

It's been a while since we checked out our big spring project. Remember we built six raised veggie garden beds.

Let's take a peek....

Ah....the fresh dirt is ready for planting. I checked and its loaded with big juicy worms, too. Just perfect for growing baskets and baskets of produce.

Wait...what's that in the far bed. Is something coming up already? Let's move in for a closer look.

By golly, is it what I think it is?


YEP!


Our first batch of iceberg lettuce is up! I told you all we were garden masters. Wait till you see what's happening tomorrow in the garden.

HINT....it's quite a bit better then our first harvest.

Spring project....part 3

Today was H.O.T. There is nothing like waking up in April and jumping right into mid-summer. We knew we were a little behind on working on the garden, but this heat made us kick ourselves for not finishing the job sooner! Check out what we accomplished.

This is landscape fabric and we decided to put it down on the walkways in between the beds. The thought is that we may get some mulch later on, but for now this will work.

Here's a casualty of the garden project. It was a "cute little bush type thingie" that was in the way. Can you tell I'm a seasoned gardener?? I have all the right vocabulary down pat.

Almost finished with the landscape fabric. The temp is in the 90's and we had to keep taking water breaks. Not exactly the type of day to be doing this work, but the clock is ticking.


Next up are the fence stakes. We need to keep the dogs out of the garden beds. I can imagine puppies racing right through my tomatoes and hearing snap, snap. That would make me cry. So, the fence went up. I don't want to cry.




Dodger is feeling better and is back on duty. Mike said he was "guardin' the garden". Get it?



Ah, the fence is up. We invited my parents over with their dog to test it out. It worked. He looked puzzled, but he didn't try to run through it. Success!

It was getting dark, but we set up a grid on the small bed. I plan to plant herbs in here and wanted a way to keep them straight until they come up. The herb seeds will go in tomorrow. I ran out of daylight. The lettuce, carrots and radishes are planted. Crossing my fingers and hoping for something green to pop up....

other than a weed!!

SPU.....

...otherwise known as Spring Project Update!

We wound up with 5 - 4'X8' boxes and one 4'x4' box.

This weekend was productive and quite a bit of the mountain in the driveway was wheeled to the backyard. I believe there is an offer on the table for son #2 to finish it up when the weather dries up.

I can almost taste the home grown tomatoes!!

Spring projects continued....

Well, as far as spring projects go in the house I am woefully behind. Being under the weather for a week didn't help. Add some grey, rainy skies in there when I did start feeling better and you can certainly understand my lack of motivation. However, today is gorgeous. It's mostly sunny and 73! So, we are back to the outside spring project. :)

Here is one double layered box leveled and staked in the ground. It's ready for some dirt.

We are crossing our fingers and toes that the chicken wire on the bottom layer will help keep the pesky moles out of the beds.

A humongous truckload of dirt and compost was dumped in the driveway earlier this week.

The plans for the raised beds came from here. According to PW's plans, it is handy to have a Basset Hound around for support. (look halfway down her post) We don't have one...but we do have a beagle on standby....you know, in case we need him.

spring projects (part one)

Oh, I am sure there are going to be plenty of spring projects. I love spring projects. LOVE them. I get really antsy towards the end of winter and start dreaming of spring projects. You just can NOT start a spring project during winter. Nope. It doesn't work. There is something magical about spring projects for me and I plan to share some of the magic with the world.

Yesterday was outside day. Of course, the calendar says spring...but our weather isn't entirely cooperating. Well...maybe it is. However, when you start working on building raised beds for vegetable gardens you kind of expect it to be warmer. (this is coming from a non-seasoned novice wienie veggie gardener...because everyone knows that a real veggie gardener starts working on the next year's garden long before spring!) Anyway...it just felt a little chilly to me! We got our plans for the raised beds from here. After a late start in the morning we made the lumber run and stocked up. Then it was time to start.

All stacked up and ready to go.

Tools are gathered.



Spot is picked.



The bottom levels are built and waiting.




Spring projects are so much fun!!