Oh, to hoe

I planted my garden between mother'a day and Wednesday, May 13, in accordance with the Farmer's Almanac's recommended planting days. Kevin had tilled the "new section" of the garden last fall, but as I learned, spring tilling would be ideal. I hoed the new beds by hand, which was an immense workout. I found the physicality of it to be enjoyable although demanding, but I'm thinking I might invest in a rotatiller for future planting seasons. Here is a few photos of the prepped beds. 

This is a 10x10 (or so) bed.

Ready for planting!

I only managed to prep about 1/3 of the other 10x10 bed (far side of the photo, next tot he tarp--the tarp is covering the un-prepped portion of the second 10x10 bed). I intend to prep it for a late planting of cold leafy crops.

I will follow-up soon with progress photos, including some of my fruit garden, where strawberries abound!

2014 Gardens: New fence, and plantings

Vegetable garden

My husband was kind enough to tear down the deer fence that served as my garden's perimeter for two years at the end of last season;  he also rotatilled enough ground to more than double the size of my gardening space. Once spring was upon us, he designed and bought supplies for the new fence.

I managed to remove a fraction of the countless maple seeds that sprouted in my raised bed, with the help of my oldest son and the girl next door.

The posts are up! Construction is underway; I was so excited to have a solid, new fence, and the boys were equally enthralled! I was already dreaming of the number of climbing plants I could sow along the perimeter!

The fence is complete!!

Enter Mother's Day: I picked up vegetable plants at the Royal Oak in Bloom market after a lovely breakfast at Cafe' Muse (my favorite). Michael chose the flat of petunias as my mother's day gift :-)

A table littered with things to be planted, including the squashes and melons I started from seed.

I began planted green beans, squashes (long island cheese pumpkin, spaghetti squash, acorn squash, cucumbers and pickling cucumbers) and melons (three varieties of watermelon as well as cantaloupe) along the perimeter on Mother's Day, as well as 8 asparagus roots and 1 sweet potato plant. Today I began populating the raised bed; I planted a variety of tomatoes (roma, cherry, yellow pear, and big boy), peppers (red, orange and yellow sweet, plus banana), and cruciferous vegetables (red and green cabbages, broccoli and cauliflower). I planted Brussels sprouts along the remaining open space of the perimeter.

Voila!!

Pretty little petunias!

Fruit garden

The far side of this garden is laden with strawberry plants (all around the lilac bush). When I first started weeding this bed a few years ago, I almost plucked them all, thinking they were weeds. Thankfully I had acquired a strawberry plant amongst others from my colleague; when looking for a place to plant the strawberry, I realized my silliness. 

The strawberries are propagating nicely, and I've decided to add more fruits to this garden (amongst other edibles).

The garden "as-is" (minus some weeds); prior to adding edible plants.

This lattice here is rather lonely. I planted luffa gourd during my first growing season, and they utilized the lattice rather well. Since then, it's just been the clematis (except for some failed cukes one year), which never really flourishes. I grew up playing in and eating from a large grape arbor in my grandmother's yard, which inspired me to start some grapes here with the lattice .

This photo isn't particularly telling, but I planted 4 green zucchini, 4 sage, 1 basil, 1 blueberry, and 2 concord grapes (one on either side of the lattice). I have another grape to plant (I forget the name of it),  and plan to place it near the clematis.

More work to do
I still need to clear the remaining grass from the rest of my vegetable garden, and then get to planting seeds and other root vegetables (such as beets and onions that I bought from the market yesterday). I barely have enough room for everything!!!