We had cleared this area last Fall anticipating that we would have a garden this year. This was quite the endeavor as we had to cut out the sod that was in this location. WOW, did that go over well with the Alaskan. See, that sod was laid just a few years ago with much sweat and effort, not to mention expense. So suggesting we remove it for a garden was just another of my crazy ideas that I wrangle him into to. And even more crazy was my suggestion that we MOVE it to another location in our yard. Cutting it out ( not to mention cutting out the old grass in the location we wanted to move it to) and moving it was no small feat which he begrudging accomplished with only a few swear words.
We dutifully planted some crimson clover as a cover crop which grew so well, almost to our knees. But this spring due to scheduling and vacations and a certain Shed Project, we never got to actually to prepping and planting the garden. (Well, in all fairness we HAD planted some herbs, peppers, cucumbers and blueberries in various locations around our yard since the garden wasn't ready - but it just wasn't cutting it.) So this past weekend with the laundry from our vacation finally done and all of the camping gear stowed away (and we had nothing better to do) we though we would FINALLY get some veggies in the ground! Really, we were both getting sick of how the yard looked (mud and weeds = not so attractive) and we knew that if we didn't get this going soon it just wasn't going to happen this year at all.
The area was FULL of weeds, we had mowed the cover crop in the spring but between this and the patches of left over grass it was frightful. The ground was dry as a bone, so it took quite a bit of muscle to remove the majority of what was there. 
And then came tilling and mixing in some compost. YEAH! for big muscles!!! This machine packs some punch. A few times it really yanked him around.
My job with the camera (sitting back sippin' a mojito) was easy :)We have a pretty small space (and an even SMALLER attention span) so built only two beds to start. The beds weren't necessary but are nice to contain the dirt. To help with weeds and mud around the beds we laid gravel. We wanted to just start with a few plants for now as this is a trial of sorts to see how good this location is (tucked between the shed and the house we are hoping there is enough sun throughout the day) and how well we can maintain these crops. You know the whole best intentions. We are great at starting, not so good with finishing :) Check in at the end of August and we'll see if we are still enjoying this project.
We ran a drip irrigation system to hopefully automate the watering. We still have a busy summer ahead and don't want to be tied to watering.
We hope to add some hardware to these beds in the Fall that will allow us to add some removable PVC supports for the addition of a greenhouse like cover to the beds for spring planting. That should help us get some crops in earlier next year and extend our growing season just a bit.
We planted our plants, which also meant moving some of our already producing plants - not sure how that will pan out, we'll see.
So we now have a little piece of earth growing a few editable things like tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, herbs, lettuce and beans. It's not much but it is a start.
When all was said and done we stood back and looked upon the vegatables of our labor and all I could think was: "Next year we'll have chickens too!"~ a country girl at heart trying to make do in the city
