As we get closer to planting our garden we have things blooming and growing. This weeks garden tour will show you what all we are growing and prepping for this years garden beds.
New flowers
Since Mother’s Day was this past weekend, my husband and kids surprised me with a trip to a local greenhouse. The big kids walked through the different buildings with me looking at all the things growing and asking what I thought was pretty. Then, they sent me off to play with the babies. They walked though showing Brent everything I said was pretty, trying to get him to buy every single plant. The kids were so sweet about it and wanted me to be surprised.
We ended up getting all the petunias I said I thought were pretty. That was 7 different colors, plus a beautiful hanging basket of purple and green petunias. We always get our mothers flowers for Mother’s Day, so we got my mom some geraniums and my mother-in-law some red, white, and purple (they didn’t have blue) wave petunias for the three tiered planter my husband made her. They look a little sparse right now, but in a few months they will be flowing beautifully.
Container growing
So far we don’t really have much planted in the raised beds. It is still getting awful cold at night, plus my greenhouse plants are not ready to transplant. The strawberries we have planted in the raised bed attached to the porch are doing amazing. I cannot believe how many blooms and strawberries we have growing right now. Very soon they will be turning red and be ready for eating. The big kids are so excited.
Our Greenstalk planter is doing really great. It won’t be long at all until we are able to have a salad from it. The kids all love salad night in our house, so being able to get most of our veggies from our own backyard will be exciting. Gage and I planted our carrots and radishes this week. The radishes are in big flower pots in the font of the house and the carrots are in some of the black totes in the back yard.
The onions we planted in the black totes are looking great. Well, I think they are; I won’t know how great the roots are doing for a bit. I wasn’t too worried about my carrots. They take a while to germinate. Then Miss Sheba decided we didn’t need any dirt in that bin. I guess the dirt looks better on the back patio. She is my digger so I guess I should have anticipated this. I may still be able to get carrots as she only dug up one tote.
Greenhouse Growing
I am starting to really see growth in the greenhouse. My peppers and tomatoes are sprouting finally. They still have a ways to go before they are able to be transplanted into the garden beds. At least they are showing signs of life. My flower seeds I planted are starting to sprout as well. Olivia is very excited to see the seeds she planted grow.
As much as I love my inexpensive greenhouse there is a problem. It gets hot, like really, really hot during the day. Then it doesn’t retain the heat well for the cold nights. This isn’t a major issue and I am working through it. My cucumbers and melons are not working through it though. I have burnt several of my plants while trying to get the right system in place. They can still be direct sown once it gets warmer, but I am a bit bummed about it. I did learn a lot because of this failure. So I will take this as a learning experience.
Building and filling
As the rush of people wanting Brent to build them raised beds is slowing down we are able to start on our own. We are getting mine built as we have the time. Between the kids, work, and just life in general it can get tricky to carve out a block of time to get them done. Brent had 10 yards of dirt/compost delivered yesterday so we are in the thick of building and filling raised beds.
The 10 yards of dirt should be more than enough to make sure ours are filled and we are able to fill our neighbors new beds as well. We like to fill the bottom of our raised beds with straw or hay. I wasn’t sure how well it work, but this year we moved our beds. That means digging all the dirt out of one and putting it into the next one. The straw we used had composted beautifully and it was so full of worms! The soil looked amazing so I am going to continue to do this.
A friend of Brent who owns a farm as was able to deliver 50 bales of old hay to us this year. These will all go into the beds, compost, and used as mulch as the season goes on. I am currently using some of them in the greenhouse to set my planting trays on.
Hopefully we will be able to get the plants in the dirt soon. We cannot wait for all the yummy food from our property this year. What all do you have growing this week?
To read more about our greenhouse click here!
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