Planting time

Heading out to the garden. All of the beds have been stained, reinforced and filled with good compost and soil. The walkways will soon be filled in with mulch, and there are still 3 beds that will be built, but today I have to plant.

Ready to plant tomatoes...These tomatoes are Burpee Big Mama's. They're great for paste, sauces, slicing and canning.

Using a clean, sharp scissors, trim the lower leaves off, leaving 2 to 3 top branches of each tomato plant and bury them deep. They will put out roots from the stalk making your tomato plants vigorous and able to absorb more nutrients and water.

I know they look like a tree, but doing this and burying them deep will give you a much more vigorous plant.

Now that they're buried, give them a good drink. To keep diseases down on your tomatoes, it's good to prevent soil from splashing up on the leaves. You can mulch around them with peat moss or straw.

12 tomato plants planted and staked. I also planted two packages of Nasturtiums inbetween the tomatoes in each bed. Hummingbirds and bees love Nasturtiums...plus they're also edible and go nicely in salads. First two beds filled! On to the next ones...

Putting the Beds Together

I used 3 1/2 inch L-brackets and placed two in each corner to reinforce the corners. This will get the beds put together since the compost is arriving soon. I will add more to the corner supports later, but had to get them put together and up before the truck arrives. Once the beds are assembled, I added 2 1/2 inch screws through the ends of the beds connecting the end to the side also for more support. Then I pounded 18 inch 2x2's that were angled at the ends into the ground mid way down the length of the bed and up next to the wood, then screwed them into the side boards for support along the length of the bed. The ground is still a bit uneven so I will dig some of the dirt from inside the bed and place it in the holes to level it out. If the weather had permitted me to till up the pathways, this would have helped to level the beds, but it's still too wet to til. Hopefully next week will be good for doing that, then laying down the weed tarp and topping it all off with mulch. The garden will eventually get fenced in with a picket fence with a gate, but for now...this will just have to do.

Constructing the beds

Wood is HEAVY!!!

We have had daily rain for nearly 2 full weeks and today was the first day I could even get outside to work. Sadly, the area we removed sod from was already beginning to grow grass again. Ever feel like a dog chasing its own tail?
Anyway, the huge stack of wood, although it had been covered in plastic, still managed to get a bit wet. These boards were 2"x12"x12' planks and they weighed a ton! Trying to drag them down one by one to the side garden spot was not only difficult, but nearly impossible for one woman. Since all the kids were in school and I HAD to get the job done, I pulled out the wheelbarrow. I took one board at a time initially over to the side yard, which is down a small hill. What a joke!!! It kept sliding and tipping and was just an exercise in frustration. I figured I was the comedy relief for my neighbors for the day! But seriously...there had to be a better way. Thank goodness for bungee cords! I marked the center of the 12' boards and centered one onto the wheelbarrow. Then I criss-crossed two bungee cords over the board and attached it to the wheelbarrow. Voila! I figured if I could do this with one board, why not two? Although heavier, it was still manageable. So...that's how I hauled 26 of those 2"x12"x12' boards to the garden...alone! Who needs the gym when you've got a garden to build?

Hauling wood to build the garden beds

Garden Planning Site

This is a GREAT garden planning site. If you want to see my garden, go to this site
Plan Your Garden With Plangarden It is designed to resemble a French Potager, or kitchen garden. Although decorative, is functional.