All in a Day's Work....

Long time blog readers will know that this garden used to be a vegetable garden. Last summer after much research and conversation with coworkers who garden, I tested a patch of yard in the back by the kids playhouse. I put different vegetables into pots and plunked them back there to see how much sun the spot got, and how well the vegetables did. It was a huge success. We decided this year we'd put in a new vegetable garden and I turned the other one into a bird garden.




Rachel posted a great link to a site about Square Foot Gardening. It was pretty much the same idea I was going for, with squares (I was going to do a large rectangle) and a grid. Saturday I bought lumber at Home Depot (all alone, go me!), had it cut to the size I wanted it, and today The Boy and I put the boxes together. Our yard is very slope-y, and he had a brilliant idea to dig out under the boxes to level them out. I love how they came out. With any luck the weather will hold out tomorrow and we can get the stuff to fill the boxes, and some vegetable plants. After that, I will put a grid over the top made from lathing strips and we'll be good to go. Each box is 4x4 feet, and 6" deep (apx.). We put landscape fabric on the bottom to cut down on the weeding, and it really didn't take long at all. The longest part of the whole project was digging out the grass to level the ground.




I normally grow t'maters, cukes, and green peppers. In the past I have grown peas, eggplant (tricky, they didn't work out well), and green beans. When I lived in the city (I had a small plot in the yard) I also grew (on top of all those things) zucchini and cantaloupe. The only thing that never grew well was the cantaloupe. I'm not sure yet what will get planted into these boxes, we'll have to see. I'd like to try growing birdhouse gourds, but I believe you have to grow those from seed and it's already way to late in our short growing season to start seeds.


And because she's new and adorable, I leave you with a photo of Bailey. The dog is adjusting to her much quicker than I thought she would, and our older cat (who is a scardey cat) got hissed at the first night when she was still new and scared, and has pretty much left her alone. Isn't she cute?! The Boy took this photo today when I was outside right after she fell into the basket that houses our magazines. She's quite a handful.