Saturday, August 27, 2011

Winter Garden Wonderland

I have wanted to plant a garden for some time now and as the summer ticked along I thought it would be another year of dreaming. But the other day I was reading about winter gardens and how to keep them going through a wet season. Since Oregon doesn't get too cold, just super wet, there are lots of plants that make it through the winter! So, I told James about my research and he said..."What are you doing tomorrow night? Let's build a garden!" I didn't hesitate one second and was like, "I'm in!!!"

So, we have a garden!
We decided to go with a raised bed since it was the easiest way to get a quick and semi-permanent garden without tearing up a whole section of our yard. We got a little hand tiller and got to work! James did most of the initial tilling since our dirt is hard as rock. I pulled out the grass and weeds and then tilled it up nice and smooth. We also built a simple frame out of 2x6's and some corner brackets. The next day I went and got a huge truckload of dirt and picked out plants (my favorite part!). I worked for about 3 hours moving dirt while Vinnie dug to his hearts content. Then I put in the plants, watered and voila...a garden!

I planted some herbs, a variety of greens, sweet potatoes, winter strawberries, snap peas, and beets, carrots and squash from seed. Many of our plants will probably get harvested before it gets too wet, but I'm just excited to actually have a garden!

Vinnie totally loves it too. Maybe a little too much. He loves the "fresh" smelling compost/soil that it is filled with. We may end up putting in a little fence so he can't dig too much but for now it's not bad.

I also saw a really cute picture of garden labels on painted rocks so this week I scrounged up some good rocks and made them into cute plant labels. My favorite is the Sweet Potatoes cause the color matched the plant the most.


We love our little garden!
Stay on the lookout for future posts on delicious meals we make with fresh garden ingredients!



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