The November garden

Gardening in November is somewhat bittersweet.

In some ways, I am disassembling everything I’ve created in the past eight months.  I have put away the hoses, flower pots, yard decorations, and patio furniture.

In the midst of all this, I am also creating.

The trees have mostly dropped their leaves and I’ve stuffed both compost bins as full as I can.  The remaining leaves will be chopped when Pete mows the yard one last time and then the bagged clippings will be raked out in the kitchen garden.

I am more than a bit obsessed with compost these days, as a year ago this yard was red clay with lots of rocks thrown in for good measure.  I have added multiple cubic yards of mulch and compost to amend the soil in the kitchen and flower gardens, yet there’s so much still to be done.  Yes, things grew, but not as well as they will in a couple of years when I have improved the soil further. I was especially disappointed in my tomatoes this year and know that better soil would have given me better results.

Having built gardens from scratch before, I know that it will take me a couple of years to attain the rich black soil I yearn for, so I’ll just have to be patient in the meantime.

I am also reviewing the 2009 growing season while I’m outside raking and cleaning up.  I’ve been making notes on what worked well for us and what did not.  I am also planning the layout of the 2010 kitchen garden and what I will plant in each section.  I’m doing research on new plants we’ll add, including the possibility of apple trees, hardy kiwi, and maybe even a walnut tree.

The weather is still nice here in Virginia and we’re probably a month away from our first snow.  It’s tempting to keep working away outside — creating new flower beds, mulching paths, and sneaking in a few more plants.  But I’m going to call it a day, so to speak, and take a break.  By the time February rolls around, I’ll be rarin’ to garden again.

So what’s next?

I’m sure you’ve noticed that I haven’t posting here as much as I was during construction.  This started out as a construction blog and now that we’ve been in the house for nine months, I’ve been debating whether to stop blogging here entirely or to shift directions.  I’ve decided on the latter option.

I’ve talked here and on my other blogs  how much much I love gardening.  I started out as a flower gardener, but this year started focusing heavily on my kitchen garden.  Pete and I want to start growing more of our own food — it’s easy, it’s inexpensive, and the results taste far better than what’s in the grocery store.  There’s also the satisfaction of sitting down to a meal that largely came from our own garden.

So this blog is going to talk more about our efforts in gardening.  I have a lot of ideas and plans and can’t wait to talk about them more in the coming months.

Whoops, it’s been a while

So I just realized that I haven’t posted here in over two months. Whoopsies. Time just got away from me.

My last post was about changes I’ve made in the kitchen garden.  The yard and garden have consumed a lot of my time this fall.  A lot of people think of gardening as a spring and summer thing, but I’m out in the yard working on some project or the other nine months of the year. And we definitely got three seasons of veggies out of our kitchen garden.

All that’s left in the kitchen garden at this point is herbs and fall vegetables.  I planted lettuce, which we’ve been eating in salads for weeks.  I also planted cauliflower and expect to start harvesting that in a week or two.  The broccoli is probably going to be a bust, as some insect has nibbled it nearly to death.

Looking back at our summer veggies, I’m incredibly disappointed in how our tomatoes did.  I attribute it to our piss-poor garden soil, because those plants were watered, weeded, watered, mulch, and practically mollycoddled from planting to first frost.  I had hauled in bags and bags of good dirt and mulch, but apparently that wasn’t good enough.  We have two compost bins in the yard and I’ve been adding as much organic material to those as I can scrounge up  With any luck, we’ll have lots of compost in the spring that I can use to amend the kitchen garden.

I’ve also been laying down landscaping paper and thick layers of mulch in those places that I want to turn into flower beds next spring.  By doing it now, I’m giving Mother Nature a chance to kill the grass under the landscaping paper and for the mulch to break down and mix in with the dirt underneath.  It will definitely make my job a lot easier next spring!

I’ve also been making slow but steady progress in the front yard.  I’ve mulched all the way up to the front porch, under the porch, and along the foundation in the front and along the side.  I also planted a ground cover around the porch and hope that it will spread and fill in quickly.

I still haven’t posted photos of the new shed, have I?  I’ll try to get to that soon.

The kitchen garden — late summer

I’ve been making some changes in the kitchen garden.

Here’s what it looked like in May:

And here it is as of this week:

The biggest difference is that I connected the five individual vegetable/herb beds into one large one, which almost doubled my growing space.  Later in the fall, I will use stepping stones to divide the large area into eight smaller ones.

Most of the gaps in the bed now are where I covered the grass between the five original beds, but there are a few other open spots where I’ve pulled out plants now that it’s late summer and they are past their prime.

I have begun to put in some fall veggies, starting with cauliflower.  I hope to add broccoli and lettuces soon.

On the right side of the photos above, the skinny mulched area was originally where I put my raspberries, but I didn’t like the way it looked, so I moved those to the back corner along the fence.  My plan now is to put hydrangeas in that area to complement the peonies that are just out of sight at the bottom of the photos.  Also, the small rose bed in the botttom right of the photos is now balanced by the beginnings of a similar bed in the upper right of the second photo.

The border along the fence is where the blueberry bushes are, as well as various roses, perennials, and other plants I’ve been planting for visual interest and to attract bees, butterflies, and dragonflies.

I would like to eventually get rid of all the grass in this area of the yard and instead have mulched paths.  It’s going to be a laborious project, so I’m not rushing to start it anytime soon!

Jeff and Tom are outside right now finishing the siding on the shed.  I hope to paint the door next week, then will post photos.

Adding a wee bit more storage

I mentioned yesterday that Jeff the Builder and the guys have been over here recently.  The main reason for their presence is that they’ve been working on our garden shed, which has evolved into a slightly larger structure that will also hold our bikes and other sports equipment.

But that’s not what I’m going to talk about in this post.  Instead, I wanted to show you this:

This is the corner of the craft room that wraps around the stairs.  When we were planning the house, Pete hit upon the idea of squaring-off the opening and creating a little alcove for future shelves, which were built this week.  Even though the girls have a book nook outside their bedrooms, we’ve already more than filled the shelves and found ourselves with a bit of an overflow problem.  Book Nook 2.0 gives us more space, which I’m hoping we won’t fill too quickly.

The front yard.

Why hello there.  Did you think we had forgotten about this blog?  We just didn’t have anything to report to report for a while, but now we do!

Let’s take a look at the front of the house, shall we?

Does anything look different to you?

Here, I’ll zoom in a bit:

Now do you see it?  We finally had the glass in the garage doors tinted last week.  I love how it looks — light still comes in, but you can’t see inside.

On the landscaping front, we’re making slow progress.  To the left of the driveway, here’s what it looks like right now:

The plan here is to have a hillside filled with shrubs, so we (mostly I) are covering the grass with landscaping paper and a thick layer of mulch so that HE won’t have to mow while the bushes are filling in.  This project is taking longer than I had hoped because I utterly hate laying down landscaping paper, then hauling over 5-7 loads of mulch from the pile and then dumping it out.  If the yard were flat, it would be much easier, but then again, if the yard were flat, we wouldn’t be trying to fill it in with bushes.  Luckily, I have only one more row to do to reach the porch stairs and then the worst part will be over.

On the other side of the driveway, it looks like this:

Okay, so this isn’t a very good photo, I know.  What I’ve done over here is plant two rows of butterfly bushes — hot pink on the far right of the mulched area and then dark purple to the left of it.  The buttefly bushes are still pretty small, but getting a little bigger every day. I think they’ll be a good size by the end of the summer.

All the green splotches in the mulch are phlox in mixed colors (lavender, pale blue, light pink, hot pink, and white), which will eventually fill in and create a lush green groundcover for most of the year, but in the spring — WOW.

And you might have noticed that big yellow tool box in the photo.  Jeff the Builder and crew have been here working on a couple of  projects and I’ll post photos soon.

A manlier Man Cave

The man cave got a little manlier this weekend:

Yes, the girls are now air hockey fanatics.

The cool thing is, it’s not just an air hockey table; at also has pool and ping pong.  You can see the ping pong cover leaning against the wall.  To play pool, you roll out a rubber mat on top of the air hockey part.

Now Pete just needs to hang his dart board and his Man Cave will just ooze testosterone.

Quick update

Even though I haven’t posted here in a few days, things are still hopping out in the garden.  First of all, check out the latest on the patio:

We’ve expanded it by a couple of rows and then did that neat cut-out with the tree and the flowers.  The tree is an Eastern Redbud that I dug up in the old ‘hood.  Unfortunately, even though I’ve watered it faithfully, the leaves are looking really droopy and I’m not sure it’s going to survive the transplant.  So I might be putting a new tree in this fall.

I also transplanted some peonies from the old house:

Oh, and the peas are growing like mad:

Since this photo was taken last week, the peas have reached the tops of the supports.  No peas yet, but I’m hopeful.  The lettuce, on the other hand, is growing s-l-o-w-l-y.  Maybe I should have put the seeds out earlier?  I don’t know, but I do know the lettuce will be mercilessly ripped out in another week or two whether it produces or not.

So that’s what’s going on ’round these parts…

Recycled homes

Here’s an interesting post on houses made of some unusual things, including airplanes, missile silos, and more.

The kitchen garden

I attended a seminar on kitchen gardens earlier this spring and learned, among other things, that a true kitchen garden is one that has a certain symmetry and form to it — aesthetics play a big role in the design and plan of a kitchen garden.  So there are flowers mixed in with the edibles.  Not only are the flowers there for beauty, they also attract bees and butterflies, which pollinate.  No bees equals no tomatoes in July.

I think our garden is fitting the bill nicely:

This is still very  much a work in progress, but I think you can see where I’m going with this.  Right now, we have 200 s.f. for veggies and herbs and another 120-150 s.f. for berries.

The main part is the five vegetable/herb beds, each of which is 4′ X 10′.  In case you’re wondering what’s going on in each, here’s the breakdown (they’re numbered 1-5, starting from the bottom):

1. tomatoes, basil, and marigolds — Right now, I have two kinds of tomatoes (four plants each) and will be adding another variety next week.  I have six sweet basil and am wondering if I should add more.  We love basil.
2. edamame — I’ve put in two rows and will add two more rows every week this month, so as to stagger our harvest.  I’ve also tucked in a few pepper plants along the edges.
3. Peas and lettuce (spring) / Black beans and peppers (summer) — I have spring plants in now, but have started adding summer plants.
4. Pole beans, cukes, and melon — The three bean teepees have a type of pinto bean on them, which I’m planting over the course of a month (one teepee every two weeks).
5. Asparagus, garlic, and pumpkins — The asparagus will eventually fill this bed, but this year I’ve put in garlic (to be harvested next month) and pumpkins since I have the space.

I’ve also planted herbs in the corners of beds, 2, 3, and 4 — rosemary, chives, oregano, thyme, mint (in a pot so it won’t spread), etc.  Not only will they add flavor to our meals, they’ll help repel bugs and, if I’m lucky, deer.

Bracketing the vegetable/herb beds are the blueberries (left) and raspberries (right).  The blueberry bushes have small berries on them, but I’m not going to net them this year, as I want the birds to eat them so that the plants will instead put their energy into establishing roots.  I’ve also planted flowers along the fence and in other nooks and crannies, so as to encourage bees and butterflies to visit.

On the lower right, I have a small rose garden.  Eventually, I’d like to add one on the upper end of the raspberry bed, but am feeling no rush to get to it.

The rose is cherry red and already has a few buds on it.  I can’t wait!  The blue ceramic ball is something I’ve wanted for years and only just found recently.  I’m not sure it will stay there, but I thought it would add color for now.  I planted zinnia seeds around the rose and plan to add more roses at some point in the future when my checkbook isn’t groaning from all the abuse it’s taken this spring.

Long term, I definitely want to put in paths around the garden beds and get rid of all that grass — less to mow, plus the edging is already something of a chore — but that’s a project that can wait until I’m feeling ready to lay down dozens of yards of landscaping fabric and then cover it with tons of pea gravel.

So that’s what’s going on in the kitchen garden.  Any questions?