Photos of Progress

Oh, progress!

Friday, my yard guy and I hauled 3 loads of soil (7.5 cubic yards) and filled boxes. We didn't finish filling the boxes, but we sure as heck got a long way! I ended up filling the boxes I needed asap-- the last pea box, the potatoes, etc etc.

Saturday, I planted, B weeded and helped mulch the rows. Oh, it looks gorgeous.


When B was weeding, he brought along one of his homemade beers. I LOVE the color of the bottle, so I took a pic.
There he is, hard at work. I must say that the boxes look SOO much better without so many weeds.

I planted a few shallow-rooted veggies in lower boxes. My onions are the back three rows: Walla wallas, red onions, sweet white and sweet red. I misread something: onions start to bulb when the day length is 14 hours. So, you need to get your plants to large size by 14 hours, that way, they will get big bulbs. Big plant= big bulbs. (note: this is for long-day determinate onions for us folks up north). Oh oh.

Well, I can't be too down on myself, because it's been so rainy that we probably wouldn't have seen much plant growth anyway. Even my sets, which I started a LONG time ago, are pretty small. So, I'm going to cover the plants in tarping every afternoon when I get home. That will make their day length about 12 hours, hopefully giving them a chance to get big before the bulb out. That's the plan, at least!

In front of the onions, there is a bed of spinach and a bed of basil. I hope my basil turns out. I could make bag after bag of pesto and freeze it.
I planted my potatoes in larger beds. I planted rose fin fingerling potatoes (a little over 2 beds worth!!) and yukon gold potatoes (about 1 bed). Keep your fingers crossed that they're bountiful!

Note the netting on top of all of these beds. I got some deer netting to keep cats off of my beds. SO far: it's working! The little sticks on the side of the beds keeps the netting elevated. I'll leave the netting on until the plants are big enough to deter cats. On the potatoes, we'll see. I may leave the netting on until the plants cover a lot of the soil. I don't want cat poo in my potatoes.
I also built, painted, trellised, and planted my peas. I had one trellis done and another bed almost filled. But now, all are done. I must say, I have a lot of peas. I hope that the weather stays good for a while (not super hot, not freezing) so that they will grow. Peas don't particularly like weather over 70 (they become more susceptible to certain diseases), so I'm hoping that they grow rapidly and produce.
Here they are! They all range from about 3"-7" tall. I put some mulch in the center area of this bed because once the peas start to grow, reaching the inside of the bed to pull weeds will be difficult.
On to the already-planted plants...

My blueberries are very happy. Look at all the blossoms!
My currants have feathered out their leaves and are GORGEOUS plants. I'm so happy I have them. And, they have little red blossoms.
My raspberries are just about ready to blossom too. I need to string some additional wire up to keep the tall vines in place.
A semi-out-of-focus picture of my peas, reaching upwards.
My garlic is right on track. I can't wait to see what the heads of garlic look like. I won't harvest until probably June. Grow!
This is a picture of just SOME of the strawberries. They are all blooming and forming little teeny strawberries.
One of a few rose bush trees that needs to be trellis trained. But, I need to build the trellis first....
And finally, a fig. I didn't plant the fig tree, but it is shared by me and my neighbor. Very exciting! I'm going to dig up a few of it's suckers and hope that they make the transplant.

Right now, there are a few things I need to get started. I started my seeds for my purple tomatillos, ground cherries, and gypsy peppers last night. I need to start a few other plants soon, fill up the remainder beds, and build and fill the tomato beds.

The tomatoes, cucumbers, and beans will need trellising that I have to build. I think that trellises are such opportunities for new shapes and colors to be introduced to the garden, so I'm taking every opportunity to see what works. The beans will be near the peas, so I'm thinking of painting those trellises purple. The tomatoes.... I haven't decided yet. I try to do colors that will look good next to each other, but will also look good with the fruit they contain. Yellow would look great for the cucumbers, as I'm planting lemon cucumbers. Maybe orange for my tomatoes? I don't know. I don't want it to look circusy either. Should I stick to all one color? That seems a bit dull and a loss of an opportunity to be bright. Maybe a lime green for the tomatoes or cucumbers?

Hmmm... Anyway though, that's the update!