South garden in June

Look at that jungle! I know it’s been almost six months since I blogged, which is totally lame.

I thought about it a lot! That counts, right?

This year was the BEST garden year ever and it’s pretty much because of all of that drip irrigation I installed AND we had an A-MAZ-ING weather year. It’s like I was back in California. There were hits (cucumbers) and misses (beets) and instead of chronicling it in excruciatingly boring detail, I’ll just post some sort of before and after shots so you can see the transformation. Here’s the above garden in its current state:

South garden in November

North garden in June

North garden in November

I got my first seed catalog in the mail this past week and I’ve already highlighted the crap out of it. I’m also going try really HARD-ER to blog more. For reals.

I am FINALLY installing drip irrigation! Holy cow! It’s taken me long enough. I started this project last year and got ONE BED done and then…well…you know. I have that problem with finishing things I start. So…a few months ago I read a blog post by Garden Betty where she described her set up, which uses the same drip kit that I already had, just configured differently. I liked hers so much that I ordered a few extra bits and elbows and other bits and have been busy assembling said bits. So, good thing I only did one bed, right?

And since I am sort of on the topic of finishing things…

Boom. Cold frame. DONE. I got that window from a coworker over a year ago (at least) and it’s just been taking up space in the garage this whole time. It seriously took Jefe and I maybe an hour to build it. I’ve got some veggie starts under lights that are almost ready to transition into their awesome new home!

I planted sunchoke, or jerusalem artichoke tubers in a spot in the back of the kitchen garden. I’m excited to see what they do this year. Also planted but not shown: potatoes, garbanzo beans, peas and fava beans.

On a whim I decided to start saving egg cartons and toilet paper rolls because I often see people use them for veggie starts. I tried it in the past and it’s never really worked for me, but this year I COMBINED THE TWO and I feel like magic happened. I feel like a recycling genius. Although, I am positive someone has probably done this a million times before.

Look at this little pallet house! My next grand project is going to be a pallet planter for some bamboo, so I am all about pallets right now. I saw this at a local garden center and fell in love with it. It’s not practical in any way, shape of form, but it’s just so clever I can’t get over it. I’m hoping to tackle the planter project a couple of weeks so I’ll let you all know how THAT goes!

My poor african violets finally got transferred in to some larger, brand-spankin’ new pots. A local store had pots on sale so I was able to give a bunch of my house plants new digs. I am finding that attractive, AFFORDABLE pots are really hard to come by, which seems strange. I guess next time I am IKEA I need to stock up.

I am all about weeding right now. This is the “kitchen garden” and the first bed I am going to be planting into is the long skinny one in between the raised beds and the pathway. It’ll be filled with things like spinach, lettuces and peas.

Here’s the horror that is currently what I am calling “the south garden.” This one used to be beautiful, but I got super lax on mulching, then it got ran over, and now holy cow the weeds. Looking back, I should have planted fruit trees here. We are also sort of, in a fantasy kind of way thinking we could put a tiny house in this space, so…I’m just trying to keep it under control. I am mainly going to be growing potatoes in these beds this year.

It doesn’t’ look so bad from this angle. Well…minus the hoses and crap lying around. I’m thinking a chicken coop would totally fit in this space. I’m like the only person I know that doesn’t have chickens. Urban Gardener fail!

I also got my growing closet sorted out and will be starting some celery, celeriac, leeks, onions and cabbages in the next few days.

And as far as projects go we bought ourselves a fancy compound miter saw for Christmas, and I have a window and extra lumber in the garage that is just screaming COLD FRAME! Yeah!

This is my super messy garden plan for this year for part of the yard.

I have gardening on the brain right now. I just watched this awesome show by Alys Fowler I found on YouTube about edible gardening and it’s got me really inspired. Now that the seed catalogs have arrived, I’ve gone through my stash and am starting to figure out what will go where. I am still surprised how hard gardening is. Not only the physical labor, but the timing, the soil, the pests, the weathe, crop rotation…so much goes into it. My grandparents and great grandparents were able to feed their families with produce from their garden and I would totally starve if I had to depend on what I grow. Each year I get a little better, and I am hoping this year will be the best yet!

I was searching around my computer looking for a planting list from year before last and I found some half-completed graphics I started a few years ago:

I actually like that succession plan, but I don’t know where that info or idea came from. I wish I would have taken better notes. It’s also a tiny bit confusing. I guess that’s the good thing about giving things time…you can come back to them with fresh eyes.

I am going to focus on companion planting this year, which I did year before last, but not so much last year and I noticed a difference in the health and beauty of the garden. I also have a lot more space to fill up that I’ve had in previous years which is another challenge.

The main concept I am having a hard time wrapping my brain around is crop rotation within a growing season. I understand that you don’t want to grow the same thing in the same spot year after year, but I am still new to the idea that lettuces sown in the spring are going to peter out in mid summer, and I need to have something ready to stick in their place, like cucumbers or squash. And whatever that thing I choose in stick in that spot needs to be a companion to the other things that are already there and still growing, like onions. It can get confusing. Add to that the idea of succession planting, which is planting things spaced out over the course of a few months so you don’t end up with a glut of food, but a steady supply. I have NEVER been able to master that. I think I am going to have to bring in the big guns and use a Google Calendar.

I think I have finally got it figured out. I hope!

May kind of just got swallowed up, didn’t it? Where’d it go?

I’ve been really enjoying the beautiful weather we have been having this spring. I’ve seen a ton of dragonflies sunning themselves on my pea trellis. I have been a super lazy gardener this year. I had a lot of things eaten by deer (which may have sent me into a mini-meltdown) but I rallied and decided not to worry about it.

Meh.

That’s my gardening philosophy this year.

Oh boy, would ya just look at that mess?

A few months ago we had to take out three of my garden beds so that a truck could drive over them in order to get to our well house to replace our pump.

There is no recovering from being run over. What REALLY screwed me is that I got all lazy with not mulching and…well…WEEDS. Jefe’s been wanting to put a yurt or something over on that plot for his man-cave escape and I’ve been all like “No!! That’s my garden!” but now I’m all like “Dude. Yurt On.”

The issue is that I just cannot bring myself to even BEGIN to think about shoveling and wheel barreling more soil to replace those beds. It was SO hard the first time. Even though Jefe did a good portion of the work. I guess (and this is tough for me to admit) that section of the yard was probably not the best location for the garden. SIGH. Don’t tell anyone I admitted that though, okay? That’s just between us.

Once I get some new mulch put down it will look a lot better. I decided that I am going to plant the long-term-ish staple-type things like potatoes, onions, garlic, and winter squash over in this section of the yard. I’m also toying around with the idea of growing some stuff in straw bales, tomatoes in particular.

I read somewhere once that your kitchen garden should be in a location that is close to your kitchen. (!) This is especially true for lazy people such as myself. So…with that in mind, I decided that most of the garden this year will be planted in what started out as my garden before I decided to move the garden.

Follow that?

The bonus is that the beds are already filled with soil and there is actually workable dirt in the areas that don’t have raised beds. I can dig a hole and plant something in it. I can’t do that over in the other (south) garden, as there is about a two foot layer of large pebbles/river stone which makes digging completely impossible, hence the raised beds.

Another thing I decided to do differently this year was not to start all of the vegetables under lights. This is mainly because our trip to Paris would have totally messed with that endeavor AND I lost the use of one of my closets in a spare bedroom. I purchased some starts this past weekend and am kicking the garden off with those.

I AM going to start some seeds indoors, mainly things that I can’t find at the Farmer’s Market. Like Celeriac.

In other yard news, I am meeting with a landscape designer today to have a discussion about hot mess that is the front yard.

I need some professional advice as this part of the yard is highly visible and I feel like I need help in figuring out how to deal with all the issues (like the septic tank!) I’m excited to see what she’ll come up with!