Planting Corns and Beans

Yesterday morning I made the rest of my soil blocks for May (at least I hope). I made eight 2" ones for melons and seeded two seeds into each block. Now I cross my fingers and hope they come up. I also made the rest of that flat in 1 1/2" blocks. I'll use these for my lettuce successions. They will probably get seeded up mid-late May.

Chitted seed at two days

The main vegetable garden chore for the day was to get my chitted seed into the ground. On Wednesday I started chitting the corn and the bean seeds. I don't really want them to form roots, but I want them to have started the process. More than two days and they will have sprouted and then you have to be very very careful not to break off the fragile roots.

I planted the corn on one foot centers. I did one block of twelve plants in Spring Treat. As you can tell by the name it is an early corn. The second block was Shasta White which is a later corn. I'll have another two blocks of corn that will get planted up towards the end of May.

I will keep my beans organized this year. I will.

Then it was on to the beans in the back of that bed. I ran two rows six inches apart with seeds spaced 6" in each row. These beans are all pole beans and I've talked about them enough this week. The only space left in this bed is for some squash which is currently chitting. I'm growing some C. moschata squash. I don't grow much of the C. pepo (except zucchini) because the squash vine borer takes them all down before they can produce. But the C. moschata squash is pretty resistant. I'm growing Black Futsu and Waltham Butternut. So my first 4'x16' three sisters bed is almost filled up - bed 8.

I also planted the beans in the 4'x8' section with zucchini in front of it (part of bed 5). I started chitting this seed early. I have half the zucchini seed already in. The other half will go in this weekend.

The afternoon was saved for another trip to Weston Nurseries. This trip didn't go as well. Lynn my contact that was pulling the plants was on vacation. Yes they pulled plants, but they weren't necessarily the variety that I ordered. If they didn't have it they just replaced it. I wanted hosta "June" and they replaced it with a little 6" blue hosta. Like that is a reasonable substitution. Lynn alwasy emails me and asks me if a substitution is acceptable. Sometimes they are and sometimes they aren't. They also wanted to give me a different colored anemone. I said no.

Then the order itself was messed up. Last week we thought some plants weren't going to make it in time, so we just pushed the delivery date down to this week and they got added to this invoice. But then they showed up in time, so I got them last week. Those never got taken off the list for this week. The last thing I needed was 15 extra plants. What should have been a quick 10 minute pickup lasted over an hour getting things fixed. And in the end I ordered my anemones from Bluestone. I had to order the grass I wanted from them anyway and just did them both at once.

This weekend will be devoted to planting up what was ordered and finishing putting together our grill. Maybe I'll even get the first set of cucumbers and tomatoes in. Maybe. And maybe just maybe my son will remember to call me this weekend. Maybe. My daughter calls me every Saturday like clockwork so I know I'll get to talk to her. Plus she called me on Thursday this week to complain about the elections. I always know what is going on in her life. I wonder if it is Mother's Day on Sunday in Canada too where she lives?

Monday's Chores

Over the weekend the four members of Lee's End Eden (the name of our two townhouses) went out and planted up the front yard. We now have most of the front yard landscaped. Yay! The place looks much better with plants. We also planted the two apple trees which was a chore. We had to go out and buy a pickaxe to break up the subsoil enough to plant them. Then we had to sift out the million one inch rocks. The soil was more rock than soil. In addition the lawnmower shed was put together and placed and the whole yard was weeded. I'm guessing it was about 22 man hours of work spread over two days.

Yesterday I spent a couple hours in the garden doing a lot of little things. The onion bed above was struggling for some reason. I'm not sure why. I decided to bring out the fish emulsion and give it a drink. I hope they start to take off or it will be another year without good onions.

Four of my 4'x16' beds hadn't been fertilized yet so I put on a mixture of organic fertilizer, bone char, green sand, and azomite. I haven't dug them in yet, but I will before planting. I've been chitting some sunflower seed and and early batch of zucchini seed. The recent warm weather has really made me want to start planting. I'm thinking that beans won't be too long behind.

I planted up the end of the rock wall garden with flowers. It is a mix of tall zinnia, cosmos, low zinnia, petunia, and dianthus. I had to take out the overwintered kale that was starting to bloom. So I've already gotten a good start on the next Harvest Monday. Oh and you see the fence in that photo? Well that is the fence between me and my neighbor. He was out on Monday too rototilling his garden bed. Last year he had tomatoes in his bed. He might have them here again. He has another bed, but it doesn't get nearly as much sun as this bed does and his tomatoes are his pride and joy.

I planted the dianthus between the sweet alyssum in the herb garden now that it has been hardened off. I rearranged the flats soil blocks yet again since I'd planted so many. I once again only have two flats outside hardening off. Well they are all hardened already, but two flats growing outside. One is basically my leftovers and my cumin and basil. The cumin is bolting already. Hmm that isn't good. It hasn't even been planted yet. I'll plant it up soon and then maybe it will grow. It seems to be a really finicky plant here. The other flat are my tomatoes that germinated at the proper time. The rest of the tomatoes will have to be potted up soon, but they aren't quite ready yet.

As I was going by the brassica and chard bed I took a peek inside. Things are growing so well. The only really empty spot are my two red cabbages. They haven't been all that happy. They were very slow to start, but have finally started putting on some more leaves. I don't hold a lot of hope that they will grow and head up, but I'll give them a chance. In the front are the Argentata chard. The Ruby chard is just out of the photo, but it is doing well too. It won't be long before the chard harvests start.

As I went inside to clean up for the day I looked back at the garden. I never tire of this view from my kitchen door.

I'll Be Busy

Yesterday was more about getting more work than actually doing it. The first order of business was to go out in the morning to Weston Nurseries. The front yard of our landscaping was going in this weekend. Well the rest of it at least. The edibles in the front had already gone in.

We got: a 'Radsunny' Knockout Rose, a Callicarpa 'Early Amethyst', three 'Mountain Fire' Andromidas, three white creeping phlox, a 'Jelena' witch hazel, 10 'Sulphure' epimediums, and five 'Mrs. Moon' pulmonaria. This will fill in most of our front yard foundation plantings and the small bed at the end of the rock wall garden in the north corner of the yard. We will have to come again and pick up the side and back yard plants next week.

When we got home my townhouse mate asked me if I wanted to go for a bike ride. I hesitated since I wanted to plant up the end of the rock wall garden that will just have flowers. But then I remembered that I needed my seed potatoes. I called Wilson's Farm yet again (I've been doing this every day for a week now and weekly before that). Finally they said yes. They had their potatoes in. The bike path goes right down to Wilson's Farm so I said yes to the bike ride. I'll plant the bed another day.

Now the potatoes are chitting by the back door (Kennebec, Yukon Gold, and Russet). I can see some signs of life from them already, but a week in the sun, or at least a few days ought to do them good.

When we got back from the bike ride there was a package by the door. My last fruit trees had shown up. Ginger Gold and Honeycrisp apples for the back yard and a Green Gage plum for the rock wall garden. I guess we will plant those this weekend too. I've got a lot of work to do, but for this I'll have help. All four of us will be out working this morning.

Planting Up Herbs and Flowers

I'm still working hard in the garden every day. Yesterday I put together my two herb/flower beds. Which involved turning over the soil and mixing in compost and fertilizer. The first one is the foundation bed. It is three feet wide. I wanted to easily be able to pick the rosemary that will someday show up and be put in here. So every four feet I put in stepping stones. Three feet is too wide to reach across easily.

From left to right the bed has my climbing rose. Then three mint pots. The area around the mint pots has concrete and very shallow soil. It is where the gas lines come into the house and landscapers didn't give me much soil to work with. It is a perfect place for the mint pots. I did underplant the pots with some borage and forget-me-nots. I'm hoping they self seed in that spot.

Farther on I ran some sweet alyssum across the front of the bed. Between them I'll put some dianthus once they get bigger. But they are still only an inch tall and under my lights. In the back will be two rosemarys and then will be some sunflowers that I have to start germinating. At the end I'd like a sage plant. The sage plant is less than an inch tall so it will be a while for that one. I'm contemplating under planting the sunflowers with some cilantro. I don't think things grow all that well with sunflowers, but I'm hoping it works. Cilantro would get plenty of light and would self seed there every year.

View from my window

The next bed was the driveway bed along the fence. I wanted some pretty flowers in here as I see it from my hall. But then I remembered. That empty raised bed you see - well it will have my tomatoes this year. So the back cages will be six feet tall. I don't think I'll see a lot of those flowers from my window.

From left to right in the bed I planted a bleeding heart in the shady corner. They die back in the summer so I also planted some nasturtiums in front of it. Next is the anise hyssop that isn't here yet. Then five Cerise Queen Achillea.

Then a nice set of annual flowers. In the back are tall zinnias, in the middle is a row of cosmos. In the front are two rows of chamomile. I want them to self seed and continually come up every year. And right by the arbor I wanted a few feet of black-eyed-susans. However even though they self seed invasively all over the garden, I can't get them to germinate in my house. I tried both in the house and wintersown. This week I have one plant that just germinated. I wish I'd known how slow they were. I would have started them earlier. I might have to plant the area with extra zinnias and then pull them later.

Then I remembered one of my favorite plants that wouldn't overwinter well at my last house. Sweet Dreams coreopsis. I loved the different bees and wasps that came to that plant. The green metallic bees especially loved it. But it didn't like the heavy clay soil of my last garden. So maybe these will go there. And yes I ordered them. I hadn't seen them at any of the nurseries I visited.

Two hours later I was cleaning up and noticed my fava beans. Even though I turned over the soil a little in the bed after planting, it looks like most of them made it. They aren't as evenly spaced as before, but they weren't bad. It looks like I will get to try favas for the first time this year after all. Someone was asking about showing my netting tent. Well can you see it in that photo? I thought not. It drapes over the peas in the back and over the favas in the front. Bird netting is pretty invisible.

Shopping

I spent a lot of time "gardening" yesterday but that mostly meant visiting the local nurseries and checking out their pots. I needed three pots for my mints and one pot for my front steps. I wanted a really pretty pot for the front, but I wanted plastic as it won't crack and won't suck out water like clay does.

The first stop was actually a hardware store. They didn't have any plastic pots, but they did have a large bag of vermiculite which I snapped up. I also looked at their plants and picked up a bleeding heart. I have a shady spot in the corner of the fences where it would be perfect. And I love bleeding hearts. I'll have to plant a hosta in front of it eventually. Bleeding hearts die out early and the hostas comes up later. So they ought to be happy together. But the hosta will be from a split of one of the hostas that we are already buying so it will be a year or two before I plant it.

Then it was off to Mahoney's. I had a good time looking at the plants they had, but bought nothing. I didn't like their cheap plastic pots. I liked the faux stone one they had, but I knew Pemberton Farms had one the exact same one. So I bought all my pots at Pemberton Farms as I liked their cheapo pots for the mints. While I was there I looked around for plants to put in the big stone one. I bought a pretty variegated yellow sage for height. I'll put one mint in that pot too, but I'm not sure which one yet as they haven't come. I also bought a couple of small yellow dahlias and some purple petunias. They call the petunias blue, but really I think they look more purple. The mint will have some competition.

The side undisturbed by the birds

I also got to pick the first of my lettuce. No heads were chopped off, but a leaf or two from all the plants were taken. In addition I took some chives, some Fun Jen, mizuna, and tatsoi. Not much from anything, but enough to make a nice salad. While I was under the row cover, I thinned out the turnips. I ate them as micro greens, but they weren't heavy enough to weigh.

As I was picking the lettuce I noticed that the birds had been in to it. I also noticed they had plucked up a few of the cilantro seedlings. The birds are back. The birds in my neighborhood are vicious. There is a flock of European sparrows that are like locusts. A neighbor a few doors down keeps a constant supply of bread for them on the road. Well bread is a boring diet and they love to come to the garden and mow it down. I loved the birds at my last house. As I was telling Villager the other day, at my old house my birds were nice. They ate the insects. They never mowed anything down, and only occasionally stole things like a cosmos seedling for their nests. Here we don't have a nice mixed flock of birds. These are city birds. They hear about a sale going on in Daphne's Dandelions and brawls break out.

Needless to say I had to do something and I was really worried about them finding the peas before they were big enough to withstand the attack. So out came the netting and the old tent stakes. I covered most of it up. I hope that saves my poor plants. They can still get to some of the peas and can get inside the netting if they try, but I'm hoping it is enough of a deterrent. I want to make sure to get the netting off before the peas start climbing though. I would hate to have the netting tangled in the pea vines.

No Rest for the Weary

I figured Monday would be a great day to take a break from physical work. I had a lot of errands and calls to make. I would mostly stay out of the garden except for a little watering. As I watered, I noticed one of my spinach plants had come up. Whoohoo! On Tuesday many more had popped up, but still it wasn't enough to see if they would totally fill out, but now at least I know that I will have some. With spinach that isn't always a given. Then I noticed little pea shoots starting to come up. Just a tiny top of many of them, but in a few days - especially with the all day soaking rain we are getting today - they will all be up. Again Whoohoo!

My day went right as planned. Until 4:00 came around. The UPS truck pulled in front of the house. I prayed it would be for my townhouse mates. And it was. Then the FedEx truck pulled up 15 mins later. Again I prayed, but this time my prayers weren't answered. I had a box on my doorstep. Usually I LOVE boxes on my doorstep. But dang it I wanted a day off.

The box was from Pinetree. It had 30 strawberries, 22 asparagus, and 5 raspberries. Sadly my husband was off on a business trip or I would have begged him to help. I thought for a minute, but figured if I didn't get them into the ground right away it would probably be the next night or Thursday. Sadly I had to go into the store to work on Tuesday or they would have just waited over night.

Strawberries planted

I power dug all those nice plants in. First came the raspberries in the back yard between the foundation, two bulkheads and the walkway. My last raspberry patch would try to take over everything it was near, but this time they are contained.

Then the strawberries were planted in the rock wall garden where the figs and plum tree will go. Earlyglow (8) is between the gates, Sparkle (8) is next down on the rock wall. And the photo above is of the last bit which is Seascape (10) which is an everbearer. I've grown Sparkle in the past and it is an amazing tasting strawberry. I hope the others are just as good.

The last bit to do was the asparagus. The bed is about 33' long. And I needed a trench 8" deep.

The first issue were the over wintered spinach plants. I harvested all the leaves from the plants in the middle of the bed, but the ones that were off to the side I left. I'm hoping they survive getting their roots cut. I would hate to lose my only early spring producer, but the asparagus is worth it if necessary.

Asparagus planted

Then I planted them all in the trench and covered them with about 2" or so of soil. I took this last photo at just after 7pm. So I was out digging again for 2hours and 45 minutes and about as fast as I could while the light lasted. I was so tired after that.

That night I had trouble sleeping. Over a week ago I injured my bicep somehow digging. It doesn't hurt all the time. But occasionally it sends out sharp pangs of pain. This doesn't make sleeping very easy. A low steady pain is easy to sleep through, but sharp stabs that I'm not expecting wake me up. I ice and heat it every night to keep it from doing so, but Monday's chores were just too much for it. I figured at least on Tuesday I could rest. I had to work the store (an artist's coop), but that involves sitting in a chair for hours, so that wasn't an issue. I even took the bus in and back so I wouldn't have to walk that day.

Then at 5pm. The damn FedEx truck rolled in again. Sob. I swear I used to love the UPS and FedEx guys. Now I curse them. It was my order from Miller's. I had six cranberries (Thunderlake) and two peach trees (Red Haven and Reliance) . I put the peach trees in a pail of water to soak their roots. My husband was there early that day. He had a conference call he was taking at home at 6pm. So he went out and dug two large holes for me. After dinner I went out and planted them. I'm ignoring the cranberries right now they came in small pots so are safe for a while. Luckily the soil was prepared a couple of weeks ago. Peat moss was already dug in. But I figured I didn't have to go out in the fading light. Another day is just as good.

I have three more mail order deliveries to come. I have one rose that is by itself, so easy enough. I have the order for two apples and one plum. Then I have the order for three gooseberries from Nourse Farms that I know will show up today. They were the only ones that emailed me the tracking number. They won't go in today though. It is pouring rain. I'll have to let the soil dry out a bit before they can go in. Thank God for rainy days. Maybe tomorrow. Who knows. But today I have off. I swear. When the gooseberries tell me to put them in as soon as they arrive, I can tell them I'm waiting for their own good.

April Fools!

Mother Nature is playing with me again. She sent a nice April Fools snowstorm to those of us in New England. It seems I should have taken photos yesterday rather than at 6am in the morning. I really have been working hard to get the yard ready for spring. You see that white photo above? Well all those sticks represent where my blueberries and peach trees will be. Yesterday my townhouse mate and I went out and dug peat moss into the blueberry areas. This took quite a while as the soil here had been driven on numerous times. And some areas where the blueberries are going by the driveway were not well dug out by the landscaping company. The interior of the bed was well done though. There is nice soil a ways down.

The peat moss is to change the pH of the soil. Eventually the soil here will all turn pretty acidic since that is what happens when we get a lot of rain but until then I have to help it along. Blueberries are native around here. But right now the pH is at 7. Blueberries would die with that pH. They need a pH of about 4-4.5 to thrive. The peat moss probably isn't enough as peat has a pH of around 4.5. I will need to get some fertilizer for that family of plants, as we are also planting three Andromedas and a Dwarf Rhododendron which are also in the same family and require similar conditions. Oh and the cranberries. I mustn't forget them.

Beds full of compost

Earlier on Tuesday I had a delivery of 4 cubic yards of compost to top off my garden beds. I calculated that I needed 1.75 cubic yards for each inch of depth and I wanted to add two inches. That would be 3.5 cuyds. Well I ordered four assuming that I would have half a cubic yard extra. And it was the minimum they would send to me. Well they sent more. I cleared out one bin for finished compost, but it will more than fill that bin which holds about a cubic yard itself. I think the rest will have to be scattered around the yard randomly. Nothing has been planted yet except one 'Little Gem' Rhododendron. So sprinkling the excess will still be easy. But why do they send more than I ask for? Another company did that with the soil too. I carefully calculate how much I need and more is NOT better. I still have about half a yard or more of compost to move, but most of it is done. I'm so sore.

Garlic on Wednesday

Garlic today

Pea trellis just waiting for peas to be planted

So the bed are ready to be planted when the weather cooperates. The pea trellis got put in yesterday before the rain started. I'll plant peas, favas, and spinach this weekend. My MIL is in town and a lot of my time is already spoken for, but hopefully I'll be able to get a few minutes in. The seed is already soaking right now, so it will HAVE to be planted.

The weathermen promised more seasonal temperatures for the next week. Though you know how accurate they are. Right now one has Monday pegged at 65F (wow wouldn't that be nice); another has it at 47F (a few degrees below normal); still another at 45F (pout). Really? 20 degrees of disagreement and only three days away. I really hope Channel 7 is right and the others are wrong. I could use a nice warm up. Hope your weather is better than mine at the moment. And I feel really sorry for those in northern and western New England as their forecast was closer to a foot than a few inches.

Some Nice Weather

We had some really sunny and warm weather on Thursday and Friday. On Friday it even got up to 70 degrees for the first time. So of course I went outside to do a little gardening.

Now Friday was really windy. I tried putting up my hoops to make a little greenhouse to harden seedlings off during really windy days. But when I got the plastic on, it just flattened them. So they need more support. I'm thinking a ridgeline down the middle, but I think it also has to be attached to the end of the bed or the whole thing will just flatten at once. It might be better to have it lower too. Some really strong winds go along the garden, but the wind is much less lower down. Right now the hoops are 9' long. I think about 18" shorter would be better. That would take the ridge line down about 9". If anyone else does this, how do you keep it all from blowing flat in a really strong wind?

I also got to test how my screening does in a wind. I put some reed fencing in front of the compost piles to screen them. I didn't want to tack them onto the compost structure too much since I want them easy to take off. So the less the better for me. But it wasn't quite enough in the wind so I made one more attachment and it held. So that will work now. Later I'll find out how annoying it is to take on and off. I'll find out if is worth the trouble.

Then I prepared one of my cranberry beds. Well it isn't "mine". The fenced in vegetable garden is mine and the rock wall garden is mine. Which means I do all the work and reap all the rewards. But the rest of the yard which will be planted in a lot of edible fruit will be owned by both townhouses. Which means the work is shared and the harvest will be too. We have two cranberry patches. I added a bale of peat moss to the one closest to my side of the house. I'm not making a bog, but the soil does need to be acidic. The testing said it was about a pH of 7. Way too high for cranberries. I'm hoping the peat moss is enough to lower the pH enough for them to be happy. I'll have my neighbors work on the other patch this week. We also need to do the same thing to where the blueberries will be planted. I have one bale right now that we haven't used yet, but we probably need about three more bales.

Random Roundup

At least I've been earning my apple cake this week and yesterday I did penance for it. I finally finished up the beds and getting all that dirt moved. Three hours of heavy labor. And then I went to dance class in the evening. Weirdly I'm not even sore today. I think my body is finally back into working shape. I'm guessing you all want to see the finished product.

You can see it all from my front porch.

The overhead view from the second floor is a weird perspective and you can't even see one of the beds.

This is looking straight down from the same window so you can see the last bed. Yeah OK it looks just the same as all the others, but imagine a white fence along the driveway to the right with an arbor over the path. There will be a 2' strip of herbs and mostly flowers for the bees all along the fence. The fence is supposed to be put in next week. I'm hoping.

Someone (I think Toni) was asking the other day if the paths were wide enough to work in. They are very tight. They are only 19" across. Which is wide enough to bring in my wheelbarrow and set it down. Just. Barely. If I had gotten rid of one of the beds I could have had a good two feet between. A lot of people go for wide paths. I went back and forth in my mind so often. But I figured if I'm going to weed something it is going to be the bed and not the path. I'll mulch the paths, but I'll still be weeding. It will be a veritable jungle in there during growing season. I'll have to be vicious about keeping the foliage out of the paths.

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I finally pickled my jalapenos and serranos. If I get any more from the garden before the first frost I can just toss them into the jars. These are refrigerator pickles and not canned. They will be used up long before they go bad.

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The last time I was canning - hmm OK EVERYTIME I can I wish I had an apron as I get splattered with red sauce. I had plenty of cloth hidden away and I decided to start making one. This one is partly finished. I really ought to use a pattern as then I know it will come out right the first time. I kept changing how things were getting done after cutting the fabric. But I wanted a cutesy apron with frills and those don't usually cover enough. I wanted the skirt to wrap around a bit. The top part hasn't been added yet. Eventually I'll get it done. Maybe. I really hate sewing. I'd rather be digging in the garden.

I picked a reddish color so it won't show my tomato splatters as much. Maybe I should have picked off white. Then I could wear it when I bake. I get flour all over the place.

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Last week I put some GabrielleAnn seeds on the top of the fridge to ferment. I forgot about them. This is the norm for me and tomato seeds. But I usually don't forget too long. I'm allergic to mold and when the sneezing starts, I know I'd better deal with my seeds. There was some pretty gross mold growing on top, but luckily the seeds hadn't dried out yet. So I washed off the seeds to dry. I'm thinking next year I ought to grow the F4 seeds and a real sungold and see how far apart they are in taste and habit. I could get fancy and back cross them. I've never done that before. Then again I could just let nature takes its course.

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Today is garlic day. I soaked the seed garlic last night. I had just gotten into bed when I remembered I hadn't done it yet. Whoops. Back downstairs to take apart my cloves. I'm planting some unknown softneck which I really ought to name because "unknown" just doesn't do it justice. And some German Extra Hardy. I love German Extra Hardy, but the issue with planting it is that it only has four cloves on each head. Four really huge cloves. So to get the same amount as last year I have to plant a quarter of my garlic. This year I'm dumping the Bogatyr so I need to fill in with more German XH. This means I won't get to eat much of it this year. Sad, but I think making more is the best choice. Those cloves had better all make it through the winter. Having only four cloves is really a negative when it comes to planting time.

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And at least last night I ate a little bit better. I had a mix of white and brown rice in the freezer. So I defrosted it and added the fish I had bought on Wednesday to make a nice fried rice. The green is a head of my green stemmed bok choy. So at least I got my veggies yesterday. I love fried rice. Simple fast and so easy. Well as long as there is left over rice in the house.

Slow and Steady

The new garden is slowly coming along. I took out the screens in the guest bedroom so I could look over the garden. There are two windows in that room and one overlooks the backyard and one overlooks the side yard. Part of the roof blocks some of the side yard. I might use the hallway window next spring for overhead shots. It has a better view.

View of the side yard on Tuesday morning. Over the weekend my husband filled up the first bed as I made the other one and a half beds and loosened the soil underneath. The soil was amazingly compacted for just having been put there. But not nearly as compacted as the spot we are stealing the soil from (the part of the garden near the driveway). That soil is acting like clay it is so compacted, but in reality this soil is very sandy. It will be a real change from having heavy clay.

View of the back yard on Tuesday morning. On Monday evening my husband came home and told me I hadn't gotten much done that day. Then he looked out back. I filled the back beds and planted the measly four plants I had taken from my old garden. I really wanted to take more cuttings, but I didn't have time as the closing was moved up by a couple of weeks. Ah well. I took my chives, both garlic and regular and put them in the circular bed opposite of one another. I'll fill the rest of that circle with kitchen herbs since it is right outside by kitchen door.

Also I took the only plant that has been with me through all my houses. I grew these dianthus from seed decades ago. The seedlings all came up very different. Some more red then pink. Some tall, some short. Over the years they all succumbed except this one. It thrived. It thrived in the wet years. It thrived in the dry years. It slowly spreads out into a nice mat and has the prettiest pink flowers. I'm hoping I haven't planted it too late as I would hate to lose it. I planted two of them one on each edge. I took two from sections from the old garden because I figured I had a better chance of them living it I had more than one. I'm hoping they thrive and trail down the sides of the wall. In the spring when they bloom they scent the air so beautifully and I'd love them right outside my door.

View out my back door on Wednesday late morning. I always do the work in the morning if I can. That way I can take my shower after and be clean for the rest of the day. Yesterday morning I filled up bed number two. Today I filled up bed number three. Tomorrow hopefully I'll have time to build two more beds. I've ordered five cubic yards of soil to be delivered tomorrow morning. I will probably need a total of 7 cubic yards, but the big truck probably can't turn around and dump it where I want it so I ordered just enough to fill up their smallest truck. This might cost me an extra $35 but it will save me a lot of time since otherwise it would have to be dumped in the farthest corner of the yard from the garden.

So the garden is coming along slowly. I'm almost halfway done. Earlier this week I was feeling very worn down from the work. It isn't just this job. It was all the other things on my plate too. I seemed never to get any rest. I also was getting a lot of exercise that I wasn't getting before. This summer I did almost nothing except bike to the store and unpack. I was about as out of shape as I've been for quite some time. Now I'm back to my schedule of dancing, walking, biking and digging in the garden. It was a shock to the system, but I'm slowly getting used to it again. And one of my classes ended last night so I will have more time to just relax and be with my husband at night.

Started

The best thing to do for a daunting task - like putting in the eight garden beds and filling them up - is to just start. I was dithering for way too long trying to figure out what I wanted to do with the materials that I could find. So I started. I went over to Friend's Lumber. They had told me on the phone that they stocked and sold 2x6s in cedar for $1 a linear foot. Well they lied. They stocked decking which isn't a dimensional "2" ie 1 1/2", it is thinner, I think by about 3/8" or so. I really wanted thicker so there was less chance of warping.

So back to Home Depot. I had them cut their 2x6x8's in half so I wouldn't have to. That made me happy. They didn't have 16' lengths, but I wanted a board in the middle anyway to keep the boards parallel. And I could fit the 8' length in my car so I wouldn't have to wait for delivery. I got enough lumber for three beds and all of the shorter lengths so I wouldn't have to wait for cutting again.

I thought I had gotten enough hardware to put them all together. I like to use corner brackets. Two in each corner, top and bottom. This means eight screws for each corner, but I only counted four when I was doing the calculation in my head. Whoops. So instead of making three. I made one and a half.

I'm working right by the hardware store this morning, so hopefully they will have another large container of them so I can finish it off. When I put them out I was a bit miffed at my landscape designer, whose job it was to get all the dimensions right. I told her this bed needed to be 17' wide, no shorter. Well it is only about 16' 5' long. I told her it was an important dimension to me and I knew it put the path a bit close to the chimney, but I didn't care. She comes and lays it all out for the landscapers so things go in the right place. So I'm short by 7" which means I can't walk around the back of the bed, which will be a pain in the ass. I really wanted my beds to be prefect. Nice and long, but easy to walk around. Sigh. And this means the beds on that edge are more shaded. The foot along the edge really helps bring the bed out of the shade.

My husband told me that I could shorten the beds. Ack! And take away the length so I can't plant eight tomatoes along the bed? I don't think so. I want my 16'. It is more important than walking around that section, but I'm going to miss doing it. If I don't have a trellis right at the end I might just be able to scoot by. Maybe. If I lose a few pounds.

I Am NOT Getting Old

I look out my back sliding glass door often enough. I think a lot about what will go in there, but didn't have a real plan on Monday morning. I knew there would be vegetables of some type there, but how would the beds go? I'd drawn up different plans for that little spot. I debated back and forth. On Sunday the winner seemed to be put in raised cedar beds going the short way across this section. I would have three beds of about 4'x8'9".

I liked this plan. It made the organized part of my brain very happy. The other beds will be 4'x16' so things could be pretty modular. All the beds would be the same width so the hoops could all be interchangeable. But there were nagging doubts. First was that I couldn't anchor the beds well here. If you look at the above photo, the steps going down go to my sliding glass door. The area in question is the part where the bobcat is in the photo and the dirt in front of it. There is another path not in this photo that behind the bobcat. The area in question is 8'10"x15'9". And mostly surrounded by paths. The paths are anchored all along the side with plastic edging that is pounded into the ground. I didn't want to fool with the plastic edging as I wanted the paths to last. But I could cut a small portion out and pound in stakes if I had to.

The other nagging doubt was that I wanted something pretty. I'd be seeing this section every single day. It was my view. I already was going to have the compost piles along the fence in the back. Right down the path leading from my door - straight down - would be the first compost pile and more would go off to the right. Surely I could jazz it up a bit.

So Sunday I went to Home Depot to look around. Did you know they don't even sell 2x8s in cedar? In fact no one does around here. Friends Lumber could order it for me at $7 a linear foot. But for $1 a linear foot I could get 2x6s and they have those in stock. They are decking material. I looked at the pavers and rock wall bricks they had. Nothing seemed very nice. I came home discouraged.

Monday I decided if I couldn't get my beds built right now at least I could get the compost area back together as the landscapers had moved it all around. I told them to keep the pavers from my front walk which had been redone in brick to match the rest of the walkways at the house. They had piled them on my compost pallets, so the first chore was moving them over. I had almost gotten them all moved and I decided I would see how they looked in that section of bed.

I had previously drawn up a plan using bricks/solid concrete blocks, but didn't see the nice 4" thick ones at Home Depot. I figured I had these. They were imperfect because they were strangely sized. Some were 2 3/8"x 6 5/15"x 9 7/16", some 2 3/8" x 6 5/16"x 6 5/16", and some real brick sizes of around 2 1/4" x 4"x 8 ". A motley assortment. I originally didn't want to do it with thinner pavers as they are only about 2" thick. They lean over time. If I used these they would have to be dug up and reset occasionally. I could use the brick piled up two high, but the bricks would slide over time to the outside. I'd have to keep replacing them.

But my "I want something pretty" side of the brain wouldn't stop. I just kept laying out the pavers. Until it was all done. It took me quite a while. The organized side of my brain complained bitterly that I wasn't making rectangles and it would be hard to put on a row cover. I didn't listen. In the end I was short some bricks. I wondered how many. The answer was 42. Of course it was. It meant I must have done the right thing.

At least it is pretty enough. I'll have to get those 42 more bricks next time I have the car (ie when my husband takes a business trip). Then I can fill in the beds and I'll finally have a place finished to plant my garlic this fall. Maybe I'll pick up some bamboo screening too for the compost piles. then I'll have a very pretty view to look at. Of course I'll still need the fence. Maybe my next call will be poking the fence company to give me an estimated date.

Oh and yes the title. Monday night I was so tired. More so than I would usually be after working all afternoon. Surely its not because I'm getting older. It is just because I'm not used to working all day anymore. I went to bed figuring I'd be a bit sore in the morning. I was pleasantly surprised when I woke up to find I wasn't sore much at all. Then I got out of bed. Aaarrrggghh. Those butt muscles complained mightily. I had issues all day when I had to get up out of the sitting position. And when you start to get older you go to the bathroom more and have to get up and down more often. No wait. That can't be it. Surely I'm NOT getting old.

The Front Yard

The landscapers have mostly finished the yard. I showed you the back yard and now I'll show you the front yard.

This is the end of the yard by our townhouse mates door, which you can just see in the photo. The shed is for bikes. We make it really easy to get in and out of it with the large patio in front. I no longer have a car anymore. I walk; I bike; and I take the bus that stops just a couple of blocks from my doorstep. On rare occasion I take the Zipcar that is just a block away. Just past the shed is a small little patio area where we will probably have a table. It is in the shade for a good portion of the day, which is nice. The back patio that I showed you before is in constant sun all day long until really late in the day when the house shades it. So it is nice to have a shady spot. To the left you can see a small shade bed that will have ornamentals. And just past the patio area near their door is the walkway to the back. Along the fence part we are going to put in clumping bamboo. The hope is that it will be big enough to be useful to harvest for the garden, but if not then it will at least be really pretty along the fence.

In this photo I've backed up to the entrance to our yard. To the left just out of the photo is my rock wall garden. Technically the pavement here is part of the private way and the town plows it. But it feels like our driveway. If anyone comes down this road it is because they are visiting one of us. In the winter during snow days we will have to get the car off the road (our townhouse mates also have just one car, the one you see in the photo). Since we ripped up most of the driveway pavement there is no longer much of a place for them to park on the side of the road. But we didn't want to pave the front of the house.

So this is what we did. In 3/4 of the front yard we put down drivable grass. The above photo shows you the under structure of it. Underneath this they pack the ground down hard with a rocky mixture that drains well. They add a layer of sand. They add the plastic surface that will take the weight of the cars and distribute it. Inside of the plastic matrix they put good soil and then they seed. For our area drivable grass is a very ecological way to go for overflow and occasional parking. We live right next to a flood zone. East Arlington floods all the time. And as time goes on it gets worse as more and more people pave over their yards. So we wanted to put in something that would take the rain into the soil as opposed to letting it drain off into the street. Plus grass is much cooler in the summer than pavement is. It will be much nicer to open our windows out to grass than to pavement, even pretty pavement like we put outside our townhouse mates door.

They are supposed to be putting down hydroseed. They were supposed to do it on September 25, but that didn't happen. Then the 27th didn't happen. It still hasn't happened. I made the landscaper put in seed so at least something would happen. It is getting late to seed in this area. It should have been done in late September when it was scheduled.

This is my front door. The bed in front which is larger than you can see in the photo and next to the drivable grass will have two dwarf peach trees under planted with low bush blueberries. There will be one short high bush nearby and two more near my townhouse mates front door. On the left side of my door will be three gooseberries bushes. Looking past the driveway where my husband parks is my garden. There will be a fence with an arbor between the driveway and the garden. Along the path to the left, right against the house, will be some herbs and perennials for the bees. The herb/bee patch will also extend along the driveway just inside the fence.

The rest of the side of the house will be raised beds. It will take about eight 4'x16' raised beds to fill up this area. I think I'm going to do it in cedar. My issue has been finding 2x8s in cedar around here. Lowes and Home Depot both only stock 2x6s and they barely have any stock of that. I really would like 2x8s. Friends Lumber said they could order it for me, but they also said they would call back with pricing and didn't. I'll have to harass them some more. This huge undone section seems very daunting to me. I know the rest of the yard still needs planting up and mulching, but this area is mine alone, and I'm freaking out just a bit about getting it set up. I need an EG in my house that loves this kind of thing, but neither of the guys are DIY kind of guys. I'm the closest we have to a DIY person in the two families. And I like the work, but hate power tools. Loud sounds freak me out and the circular saw really freaks me out. My old garden work was all done with a hand saw, but it was done slowly over time and this is a big job. There is no way I could do it all with a handsaw.

Backyard Update

So everyone was asking to see how the landscaping project is going. I've been taking photos as it progresses. If I were doing it, I'm sure it would take over a year to complete, but hire a few guys and they build things much faster. So here is a time lapse of what has been happening over the last week.

Thursday Morning, they had just started laying bricks on Wednesday

Thursday Evening, they made a lot of visible progress

Friday Morning, my vegetable garden area to the right

Over a long weekend I went camping at UNOs (Up North Orienteers) Family Camping Weekend at Pawtuckaway State Park. The weather on Saturday was perfect for orienteering. It was in the mid 70s and sunny. So beautiful. Sunday it started to rain so we came back early after a quick Radio-O course. Which probably means nothing to all of you as you probably don't orienteer, but suffice it to say we ran around in the deep woods looking for flags in the woods using a map and compass the first day and using a radio receiver, map and compass the second day. It may look very silly but it is fun. When we came back we got to see what happened on Friday.

The back patio area is finished.

And they finished the walkway around the Meeks side of the house.

My side of the house is coming. the first section of walkway is finished. I think they are doing the garden beds last though. They are digging out down to a foot deep and putting in good soil. So I'm going to start with good soil - at least I'm hoping. You can see that there is almost room for two long beds near the back door. Along the fence will be the compost piles and work area. Farther on where the shed is (it is getting moved to the other side of the house) and around the corner will be the main vegetable area. There will be a three foot fence all along that pathway separating it from the semicircular patio. It will keep the critters out. At least I hope.

Then they put down the dirt. Yay! Dirt!

Front yard still a mess

Yesterday and today they have been working on the front yard. They have to get that part done so they can move our shed over to the front before they work on the vegetable garden area. Some parts are already done in the front. They put in dirt in the front bed where I'll have my peach tree and some along the foundation plantings. Right now I'm hoping for blueberries as a foundation planting near the Meeks front door and gooseberries near my front door (provided I can find disease free plants and provided they are legal to put in here).

The New Yard

As I write this I'm busy freaking out over the landscapers. They are digging in the front yard and using the forklift attachment on their Bobcat to poke into the soil and break it up. Our front yard has a water tank/leach field for the roof drainage. The tank is only a foot under the ground (or so I've been told by the builder). I really shouldn't be here when they do this. They don't seem to be breaking anything, just raising my blood pressure. My doctor wouldn't appreciate it.

But it is starting to come together very slowly. They have been here for a week and this is what the back yard looks like. They have spent most of the time playing with string and levels making sure it all drains properly and is flat across the yard in the other direction.

You can just see the semicircular patio section that will go in. The pathway goes right in front of the bulkheads. Between the bulkheads I intend to have raspberries. They will be enclosed by four sides so I shouldn't have much of a spreading issue. On either side of the semicircle will be a dwarf apple tree. I'm thinking Honey Crisp and Ginger Gold. The far corner will have a hot tub with a roof over it (eventually). My townhouse mates love their hot tub. I'll be using it occasionally too I'm sure.

The other side of the back yard and side yard (which you can't see) will have my vegetable beds and compost area. You can probably just make out where the path will go. Right now they taken most of my compost area apart and shoved it back against the fence. I'll have to get it cleaned up for hurricane Earl. We ought to just get a glancing blow here. The Cape and the islands will get hit big, but we are just under a tropical storm watch, not a hurricane watch. I expect I won't see many of those leaves by the time the storm ends though. I think they will be gone.

Copyright 2010 by Sally Naish, my landscape designer

These are the plans for the yard. I'm really glad I'm not the one doing the work for all this. The temps have been in the 90s all week long. I really feel sorry for them. But after the hurricane passes it will be much cooler. In fact very nice weather. I suppose I ought to get my derriere in gear though. I haven't really made plans for the raised beds. I would love to get part of them in this fall, but it might be a little while. I might live with the majority of them as ground level beds for a while and just mound up the soil to make them slightly raised. The two beds in front of the back door I want done pretty quickly though with real sides.