Mary, Mary Quite Contrary

"Mary, Mary, quite contrary - how does your garden grow?"

Well, my name isn't Mary, I'm often contrary, and last year my gardens were a flop! I take that back, my veggie garden was a flop, my flowers and herbs were okay. This year, we made the time to make some raised beds to try to make the gardens work this year.

My friend Kuckie got me started with the book Lasagna Gardening this winter. No, I'm not gonna grow pasta, etc. The book is about an organic layering method, no tilling, that leads to richer soil and less weeds. Let me tell you, I'm all about less work.

Trying to cut costs we tried to make this project as simple and recycled as possible. We still had the wood for the boxes left in the yard from other projects/housebuilding. I had months of newspapers set aside to recycle. I soaked them and laid them down for weed barrier. Then came my "organic" layers.

We live in the woods, so leaves were no problem. We've been burning brush for a year & heat our house with wood, so I had lots of ashes. Wood chips from having stumps ground down last year were pretty decompose already, so in they went too. Dug out piles of sand from run off problems last spring too. So we actually only bought a bale of peat (used far less than she called for), some garden lime (to go with the leaves), and rich top soil. Really needed more soil, but the budget is done and so are we.

We built a little box for Ryan to have his own garden. He's very excited. Ty could care less about the garden, but desperately wants to dig in the dirt. To keep him from digging up our gardens, we made him his own dirt box. Sand isn't nearly good enough. You can't get dirty enough in sand. We may regret this addition, but it sure keeps the boy busy. I'm thinking time is worth the mess.

I am however gonna start hosing the kid down and build a cloths line to dry off all the dirty messes. Can I just say mud puddles? The boy loves mud and water. Need I say more?The start of my seeds. They are now HUGE and it's too soon to plant them.

Ryan's garden

Imagine rows of lettuce, spinach, beans and mounds of zucchini, yellow squash, broccoli, carrots, nasturtium, tomatoes, cucumbers, marigolds, herbs, & more growing here!!

My resident dirt balls.