The Garden

About a year ago Traci and I engaged in some idle chit-chat about putting a garden in the back yard and how much fun it would be to grow our own vegetables. Well, little did I know that our chit-chat would turn into our next project.

About a month ago Traci came home with a bag full of seeds and some containers to start some of the seeds. We spent the next couple of hours placing seeds in the middle of these things that looked like dirt slinkies. The dirt slinkies start out compact and then expand when water is applied. Once they are fully expanded, you drop 2-3 seeds in it and then wait for something to happen. Over the course of the month we got to watch the plants break dirt and reach for the sun.

The seeds

Pushing the seeds into the dirt slinkies.

One of three types of tomatoes.

One of two trays of seeds.

While we were waiting for the seeds to grow, we started on the above ground garden box. After much conversation and a recommendation from someone with building experience, we started on our 20ft by 10ft box. We picked the back corner of the yard and started digging. Little did we know that before our house was built there was a cobblestone-type road that ran right though where we were going to put our garden. Rather than pull up the stones, someone decided to just lay sod over the top of it. So we spent a good 12 hours pulling up huge rocks and leveling out the ground. Since we had no need for the rock, we put an add on Craig's list and offered the rock for free. It was gone within 24 hours.

In the final stretch.
Some of the rock. We doubled the size of the pile by the time we were done.

The neighbor boy came over and offered his assistance digging up the rocks. I think he enjoyed the fact that we let him get as muddy and dirty as he wanted. He wasn't coming into our house, so we encouraged him to dig and move the bigger rocks. ;-) We even played this cool game with him. It was contest to see how long we could go without saying "Hey Bill". I think he went a full two minutes and lost he competition.

We finally finished up the planter box and dug up most of the rocks last Saturday. I called the landfill to see if we could get some compost and they said it would not be available until the first week of April. So we are in a holding pattern until then.

The finished planter box minus the compost and veggies

This morning we transplanted some of the tomato and bell pepper plants to bigger containers and had to find a place in one of the rooms where the sun could reach them but the cats could not. Once these get big enough, we can plant them straight into the ground, cardboard and all.

The plants in their new home

We will keep you posted on their progress and more than likely share some of the tomatoes with you as Traci will not eat them... that is ironic as we started about 40 plants.

Hope your gardens are green and the snow stop falling.


Bill and Traci