Building a Happy Home: Garden Edition

It's spring here and everything is in full bloom (nearly) and that means I have been spending more time in my garden. Last year Jeff and I decided to divide the vegetable garden into quarters by making a stone path and allowing me better access to the garden center without stepping on things I've planted. The second reason for this division is that our vege patch is just too big for the two of us. There were sections of it I didn't even use last year. Ridiculous.

So the plan is to use 3 quarters and let one quarter rest every year. If I get to the point where I need all 4 quarters, then I can just do that, but that wouldn't be for awhile in any case.

 

our garden

So this is our garden currently. It looks a bit disheveled as I really need to get out and weed, but it is what it is. Below is a layout of the garden I made in Word. Aren't I so clever?

 So what we have here are my four quarters. Top left quarter has potato sacks in it currently. I decided to try something different this year with potatoes since I hated having to mound up and mulch around them and fight the weeds that love the mulch. They usually take up entirely too much space in my garden, but I have them confined pretty well. We used old hop sacks from Jeff's winter job to plant potatoes. That section is my summer veggies section: it's going to get tomatoes, peppers, corn and beans in it by the end of this month. I'm just waiting on the frosts to pass. I think we're probably in the clear, but I don't want to risk it before the end of the month.

early picture of our spuds

recent spuds: settling and expanding the bag

The top right quarter is the first bed that I did this year. It has my onions and garlic. This is the one that really needs weeding. That's next on my chore list. I'm also going to finish out the space with more dwarf bean plants. We can never have too many green bean plants, in my opinion.

The bottom left quarter has my hot house, my strawberry hanging buckets and my rainbow silverbeet. I have already planted out peas here and soon to follow are carrots, lettuce, zucchini, cucumber and a few pepper plants. My hot house is going to raise more peppers, tomatoes and my eggplants. I love eggplant and discovered last year that I can't grow them outside, it must be in the hothouse. 

The last quarter (bottom right) is the one that will be resting this year. I've got cardboard in the shed to pull out and cover it with, wet it down and then put pea straw over it. I'll let it sit until next spring when I'll use that plot.

My husband is a handy guy and he decided the best way to divide the garden was by building me a stone pathway. So here's what he has been working on.

river stones we have collected

he uses gravel, foil bags and river stones

foil bags came from the hops place as well

it looks great!

So he's been working hard on this in between other jobs around the house. After he lays the foil and gravel, he works with the river stones like fitting pieces to a puzzle. Pounding them in, watering it all down, filling the cracks with ash from the fireplace, sweeping it, and doing it all over and over again until it's settled into place. They look great and if we change our mind about them (doubtful) then we can just pull it all up.

So what are you big plans for the garden?

ps- here's the updated picture on the wall Jeff's been building as well. Doesn't it look great?