Spring Garden Tour 2015

The mulch in the garden is all spread.  

Yippee!

Check one Spring chore off the list.

I always love how fresh the garden looks in Spring once the mulch is all spread.
We waited for dyed bagged mulch to go on sale at Lowes Home Improvement and then had them deliver 4 + pallets of mulch. 

Instagram photo

How To Make Compost ~ The Easy Way

If you've followed me for any length of time, you know I love to dig in the dirt, 

aka, gardening.

I can't tell you how many bags(and trailers full) of dirt and compost I've purchased.

It seems a little silly when you actually say it out loud. 

Some of you with gorgeous brown dirt might even think I'm a little crazy, but all of you with red clay know what I'm talking about.

Those of us with red clay have to amend our soil because pretty things and veggies just won't grow in it.

Ugh, is the first thing that comes to mind when I think of a 
 big. ugly. compost pile.

and turning and turning and more turning.

But, I don't do  that...

like the title said, it's the easy way. You might be able to compost the easy way too, if the conditions are right.

So how do I get around the big ugliness of a compost pile?

 I'm going to show you pics of the two large compost piles in my backyard. 

Do you see a pile in this pic?

How about in this one? 

 Both piles are pretty hidden by shrubs. 

See it now?

Here's where the other one is. 

Here's a closeup of the first pic. It's a pile of composted horse manure that one of our friends with a horse farm gave us. It's already composted and smells like fresh earthy dirt. I didn't make this dirt, but I wanted to show you that I disguised such a big pile.

This is the pile we actually have been composting. It's hidden between our north property line and a row of shrubs.

Here's how we make earthy black gold~ the easy way:

In the Fall, Mr. Fanatic collects and shreds the leaves that fall on our lawn with the lawn mower and put them in a big pile. We have a riding lawn mower with a bagger on it. The key is to shred the leaves really good.

The next step is to let  the pile sit and get rained on. I watered the big pile in the Fall a couple of times, but we get a lot of rain in the Spring and Summer. Make sure the compost pile gets some sun because the sun and the rain(and the worms) break down the leaves.

That's it.

If you turn the pile it will break down faster,  but I'm doing it the lazy easy way, remember?

Here's a pic of how the leaves have broken down so far. It still has a ways to go. This pile was almost finished "cooking" when I took this pic several months ago. It has tons of worms in it. Which is good. 

When it's finished, it will look like good old black dirt. 

If you're lucky and you have shredded leaves, sun and rain, you can make dirt, er compost the easy way too. 

I'm still in disbelief that I've posted about how to make dirt.

lol. 

I promise my next post will be about something pretty.

Pam

Disclaimer: The above post is how we made compost. I don't take any responsibility for any errors or results obtained from using this information. When using power tools, use safety equipment.

Open, Open, Open...

All you young whippersnappers won't remember this, but there was a commercial on TV a loooong time ago where a woman  standing outside a store the night before a big sale has her hands on the store window peering in and is saying

 "open, open, open". 

That's exactly how I feel about Spring.

Especially this Spring.

Baby, it's cold outside.

The air outside is brisk and breezy.

Not complaining after the HOT summer we had last year, but...

Nothin' is blooming and it's already March 21st

and we live in the South.

I'm just waiting for those budded out leaves to 

"open, open, open"

Ok, truth be told, our Bradford Pear has already bloomed and is starting to turn green,

But our woods look still show no signs of life

and I REALLY want to step outside my basement door and see this:

And sit for a spell on our patio in the woods

without a jacket on.

And take a walk through the woods and look up at all the glorious LEAFED OUT trees.

Oh, there is sooooo much work to do to get the yard to look like this...

Our backyard is looking pretty rough right now

& dead.

Guess what we're working on this weekend?

and the next month 

or so?

Is it Spring where you are yet?

Pam

How To Dry Basil

This past Spring, I planted four Basil plants in my garden. It's such an easy herb to grow and is a pretty plant, as well. Basil would fit right in among the other perennial flowers in your flower beds.

Basil plants are meant to be hacked back several times during the growing season before the stems start to flower, so that's what I did.

After giving some away to two of my neighbors, there were still two pitchers full of Basil left.

I left them in vases filled with water for about 5 days, then decided to preserve the harvest via drying.

I read somewhere that you could dry Basil by hanging pieces upside down, so I gave it a try. 

Simple enough.

The rest was dried the way I usually dry Basil...The leaves were cut from the stems and laid on a paper towel on cookie sheets. I set the four cookie sheets on the Dining Room table since we hardly use that room. You can also put them on top of your cabinets to dry, as well.

When they look like this, I put them in a warm oven to crisp them up. It's humid where I live and you might not have to do this step if your air is dry. I usually put them in the oven after I've baked something else and after the oven has cooled a bit. About five minutes is all they need.

Here's how the hanging leaves looked:

Once the leaves are crisp, just rub them between your hands to break the leaves in small pieces.

I put the Basil in some spice jars I saved and made a label out of contact paper with my label punch. Note to self: buy a white paint marker.

I can't decide whether I like the round jars with the green lids or the square jars with the black lids.

Either way, I will probably have enough Basil (after one more  harvest) to last me until next year.

Anyone else have herbs growing in your garden?

Pam

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Flowers For The Garden

Went to Lowe's the other day and picked up some pretty new additions for my garden with a gift card given to me by my youngest daughter for Mother's Day.

As I was deciding where the new flowers would go, a new friend  joined me in the garden. He wasn't too thrilled to see me, even when I brought him some lettuce.

 

I can't remember the name of the taller pink flower, but the other beauties are lantana, coreopsis and purple coneflower. They all like a sunny spot and hopefully they will like their new home. These flowers don't need a lot of watering once they get established. The lantana didn't even droop a little after being transplanted and  being in the sun. As an added plus, lantana and coneflowers attract butterflies.

I never get tired of looking at gorgeous trees....

or pretty flowers.

It's suppose to be 100 degrees again today. Really, it's only suppose to be 91, but it felt like 100 yesterday! What a way to start off Summer. We were having such nice weather last week and weekend....I would definitely love more of that weather.

Hope you are staying cool.

Pam

Raised Beds

Yes, it's really true! I've been telling you about our raised bed garden for months and I'm FINALLY going to reveal the four bee-u-tee ful raised beds Mr. Fanatic made for me several months ago. 

I hope you have a comfy place to sit because I have A LOT to show you!

 Here's a quick glimpse of what's currently growing...Romaine lettuce.

 Isn't it gorgeous?

The raised bed project has been a long time in the making. Last year Mr. Fanatic made me four terraced beds on the South side of our house. After a successful year of gardening in them, we started planning an expansion of gardening space. Here what was planned...

Here is a before photo of the North side of the yard looking into our backyard.. Our lot has very little sun because of all the woods we have. We have two strips of on the lot where we get the 6+ hours of sun needed to grow most veggies. 

On the North side of the yard (left side of the photo), there were 3 very large Leyland Cypress trees that we had to take out. The center tree had caught something and was dying and we figured we'd have all three trees removed to make room for our new North Garden. I had a difficult time with taking them down since it afforded us so much privacy, but it was only a matter of time before the other trees caught whatever the middle tree had.

This is another before photo. You can see one of the Leyland Cypress trees on the far left of the photo. The 9 little plants in front of the pot are the potato plants we grew last year.

Here's how the North side of the yard looked after the Leylands were taken out. The 4 large shrubs are on our neighbor's property. Pretty dismal looking at this point, but I had a vision.

In January, Mr. Fanatic built 4 raised beds out of 2 x 8's. Each bed is apx. 4 feet by 10 feet. (The ends are 4 ft wide and the length is 10 ft + the width of the ends)

Many people make them out of cedar, but that wood is so expensive and this wood should last several years. We finished the outside with a sealing stain, but the inside was finished with a non-toxic stain made from whey.

The most difficult part of this project was terracing the slope...which meant digging out the dirt. I did this by myself, by hand, with a shovel.

Wire "cloth" was attached to the bottom of the boxes so that critters wouldn't tunnel under the boxes and get our veggies.

At this point, we were filling the boxes with dirt. Mr. Fanatic filled  them with several trailer's full of dirt.

Here all the raised beds are filled with dirt and mulch we had just put down the hardwood mulch around the beds. The little dark rows on the right front bed mark where I planted carrot seeds.

Here's the North side of our yard looking into the backyard. Disregard the grass line. I hadn't dug the trench yet! Still working on it, but it's almost done as I write this! :)

I planted two shrubs which will grow quickly and keep the garden from view from the front yard.

Looking toward the front yard.

Here's a photo of the raised beds from our deck. 

This photo was taken about 3 weeks ago; everything has grown since then.

Potatoes are growing tall. The tall ones were planted several weeks ahead of the others.

The sugar snap peas are now well past the second rung on the trellis. The purple cabbage haven't grown much.

As potatoes grow taller, more dirt has to be added to cover the base of the plant so the potatoes growing under the dirt don't  see sunlight, otherwise they will turn green.

This is where my herb garden will be. The 3 plants are basil.

I planted oregano seeds to the left of the gold pot and mint on the right in the pot. Evidently, mint  will take over if you let it. I read somewhere on the internet  that planting it in a sunken pot will keep it from spreading too much. I've also planted parsley to the right of the pot since this photo was taken.

Five strawberry plants have found a temporary home in one of the terra cotta pots. I'm hoping Mr. Fanatic will have some time soon to build a vertical container for them.

For those who don't remember the raised beds Mr. Fanatic built last year on the South side of the house... here they are.

Mr. Fanatic installed a drip irrigation system for these beds. He's also planning to install one in the North garden raised beds, as well.

 

There you have it...hope you enjoyed your tour of our expanded raised bed vegetable garden. This is where you'll find me most days when the weather is good. 

I just love to watch the plants grow!

If you would like to see how Mr. F. made the terraced raised beds last year, you can see the post HERE.

Are you planting any veggies this year?

Pam

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