The Garden Comes Together

i've been piecing this post together since Saturday. It may not make a lot of sense...

This weekend was all about the garden. On Mike's days off he picked up the lumber for the 3 stand-alone beds and we got them put together on Thursday, with more digging and leveling on Friday. Friday after go off work, I picked up some stuff from the garden supply store and got to work. Here is what things are looking like now...

Side yard before... even before the fence...

Side yard after. Today we put up the trellis netting for the peas and other shade-loving, climbing plants.

And more after. Sunday evening we planted the starter peas against the trellis netting... I'm not sure there will be any room for anything but peas. We may need to extend this bed and add another trellis...

If they all survive, we'll have pea farm! I can't wait.

Weedy back corner of the yard before...

New vegetable garden corner. Here I plan to (someday) create gravel or bark with stepping stone walkways in between the boxes. Our planting beds are 3' x 8' and built out of 2" x 8" boards (not sure what kind of wood, but not pressure treated). We spent a lot of time digging to break up the very hard and rocky soil and make the area for the beds a little more level. The backyard is VERY slopey. On Sunday, I planted potatoes (russet, yukon gold, and fingerling) in the single bed, in the half closest to the camera.

These are the bags of nutrient rich amendments I picked up at "NW Seed & Pet" to add to the dirt we have to make it so things can grow. We picked up 2 bags of this "Harvest Supreme" natural & organic soil amendment with 15% chicken manure. Then picked up one more bag on Sunday evening...

We picked up 1 bale of Peat moss. This was enough for the 3 beds AND the "side yard" bed.

We got 3 bags of "Whitney Farms" organic planting compost. This stuff was cheap! 3 bags for $12. We'll probably pick up another 3 bags sooner or later. (picked up 3 more bags on Sunday evening).

After mixing the soil for the three beds yesterday and getting them put together, I realized that I had completely forgot about getting any kind of nutrients or soil for the side yard bed. I went to WalMart for other stuff and found this "Miracle-Gro" Organic Choice garden soil for only $4.44 a bag. So I grabbed two bags for the side yard and added to that some peat moss. I'll probably need another bag or two of this soil to build up the bed to the height of the trellis so the peas aren't reaching up far for the netting. (Purchased compost and soil amendment to fill in instead, see above).

Here is a picture of how big some of the rocks we dug up in the yard were. We think there may have been a road or something where our house is in the past. After digging about 6" down, we found asphalt that we had to chip at to break up and pull out. It wasn't everywhere, but in the one perpendicular bed, it seemed to be the worst.

My sister gave me some petunias that she had gotten from her boyfriend's mom and I planted them in this hanging planter that my mom gave me. I still have a bunch left that I'm not sure what I'll do with yet.