I thought it would be fun to document my garden this year for the Weekend Cooking crowd and, since flowers are a favorite photography subject, for Saturday Snapshots, too.
It’s hard to know where to start, so I went for the fantasy shot — the empty garden ready to plant.
Ready for spring planting — photo taken from the upstairs bathroom window
What this doesn’t show is how many hours of work already went into the garden this year. I removed the skeletons of last year’s plants. Rick and I vacuumed up the leaves to chop them up a bit, then raked them on the bed again for some organic matter. I hauled up seven cart-loads of compost from the compost pile (on the north down-hill side of the house) to the garden (on the south up-hill side of the house). After raking that out, Rick taught me how to use the power cultivator to break everything up and stir in all that organic matter. Then, I shoveled out paths, covered them with straw (actually, the remnants of our ornamental grasses), and raked out the beds again. Whew!
I sketched a plan for this year’s garden using the above photo for my template.
Planting plan for 2014
I have never successfully grown lettuce or spinach. My theory is that I plant the seeds too deeply so they don’t germinate or too shallow so they get washed away when I water. So, I was very excited to learn that Jung Seed had a new thing they called seed tape. I was expecting some sort of adhesive, but seed tape turned out to be seeds sealed between strips of tissue paper. Cool! And it worked — the seeds didn’t disappear before they had a chance to germinate.
Seed tape alongside the tiny lettuce sprouts from the seeds I planted a week or so ago.
Spinach sprouts — the first leaves look more like grass than a cooking green
Radishes grown from regular seeds — I’ve never had a problem growing radishes. These are terrific for a first seed experience for kids since they grow so quickly.
The blueberries started blooming!
Blueberry blossoms
This weekend, I’ll buy plants at the St. Louis Master Gardener Sale to fill the rest of my beds.
Are you growing vegetables this year? Or herbs?
Saturday Snapshots are hosted each week by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. Check out her post this weekend for lots of great photos around the web.