May 24 2015 My Garden Journal-Where It All Began

Welcome to Our Humble Garden

Here I Am

Have you ever wondered who I am and what I look like?  I bet some of you have and yesterday I finally got my husband to get a picture of me working in my gardens for you.  So Here I Am!

Just about every weekend and sometimes during the week I am weeding or planting something or other.  I am always in my gardens.  This was the last of the big gardens that we weeded and raked yesterday.  More pictures to come!

Finally we got someone out here to cut the grass.  Now you can see all of my gardens without having to see the sea of grass in front of you.  It did look nice though.  I love to have the grass mowed and the beauty of the raised gardens visible.  It is so nice to be able to sit on the front porch and see all the things that we have made with our own hands.  It has taken many years and a whole lot of work to get it to the point that it is now.  

Here is what we started out within 2001

We took out the steps and put a ramp there instead.  Then we moved the ramp to the outside of the deck so that burglars could not just walk up the the house and come into our window.

Most of the vegetation in the front was thorny type bushes and we tool them out along with much poison ivy that I am really allergic to.  

In about 2005, after most of the inside of the house was remodeled, we were able to start working on the outside.  We, at one time, thought that it would be a good idea to move the parking where we have out raised gardens now.  Boy was the a silly idea!  At the time we only had a gravel driveway.  When it snowed or froze and we were left with an icy driveway, you can imagine the difficulty walking down it with a load of groceries.  So we moved it back to the way it was.

Here is the first attempt at raised gardens.  We had no idea that the roots of the trees would grow up through the dirt and take all the nutrients from anything that we planted.  My goodness it was like something out of the Twilight Zone when we took the planters apart to build them better and seeing all those roots sticking straight up out of the forest floor and into the garden beds.

So we got some brains and when we put them together again we lined the beds with black plastic and they started to grow better.  We got lots of vegetables the first year that we had done this back in 2006.  The next few years the weather was not so cooperating and we didn't get any good crops for our efforts for about 4 years later.  We tried everything and I vowed that I would not plant anymore.....but farming (a small farm that is) is somehow in my blood.  So I planted every year.  Things and bugs and animals would eat my hard work and so I learned what to do...or at least I thought that I learned.  I began to see different insects that were not supposed to be in this area.  The deer were relentless and ate everything.  I mean everything, even the plants that they are not supposed to like. 

The next year we had lots of this growing around and on everything.  I think it is a variation on the Crown vetch weed.  We pulled and we pulled and we pulled some more and it was just like a fire as it spread and grew over and on and up everything that it could get too.  The first year we just pulled and threw the weeds down into the ravine.  Bad move on our part because the next year it had taken over the whole yard, and started growing up the walls of our house.  That was when we got the bright idea to pull it and put it in black trash bags and let the trash man take it from here.  It took a total of 3 years for us weeding that and other stuff before we actually got a handle on in. 

So we have learned much on growing our own food here in these woods and on what my parent's called this place when my first daughter was born, Misty Acre.  My daughter's name is Missy, but for some reason my parent's named it Misty instead.  I like to think of it as Misty Acre too because when we have fog or a haze it sure does look magical and misty for sure. We have one acre.  Each lot in this development is approximately one acre.  We can only want to use the top part of our acre because it is the only part that get enough sun to plant anything.  We did try to plant some lilies but the deer grazed them down before they even got a chance to grow.

Here are some of the things that we have grown over the last few years.

Now we have solved the problem with the deer and this is the simple and inexpensive solution to that problem.  The deer do not like the light that it gives off.  They do not like the motion that it does in the breeze and this is night or day.  They also do not like the sound that it gives and so this is a very easy solution to keeping the deer away from plants like vegetables, Hostas or anything they like, Including marigolds which they are said not to like.  I know this because I planted a whole bunch of marigolds one year to keep the deer away...and they ate those too!

Here is another one of my children's windmills that are protecting my lettuce and spinach.  I have one of these windmills in ever raised garden and in the main Iris garden and in the lower garden in front of the White Pine Trees.

This is what we have been doing year after year after year on our yard.  It has taken a long time but the effort has brought much fruit.  Both my husband and I have toiled in the soil for years and finally are able to take pride in our accomplishment and hard work.  We can now enjoy our labors.  The hardest part is behind us and we can now manage to keep up with the weeding, the seeding, the heaving of what it takes to take something and make it into something of a thing of beauty.  

My Husband Raking Grass and Duke Supervising him. May 23, 2015

This is Me doing what I do most of the time in my garden...Weeding!

The farthest garden with Astilbes, Hostas and various other plants.
A Holly bush is growing in there too. When we cleaned it out
we found that the deer has snacked on the Hostas there.
We don't have any deer chasers, but we are going to be getting some! 

The largest of the gardens and it took us 4 hours to clean it up yesterday
There is a large Holly Bush and I am planting different colors of
Bearded Irises and some other specimen plants there..
May 23, 2015

One of the Climbing Roses that we have.
This one is the earliest and fullest one.

Cucumbers!

Grass cut and these are the three gardens you can see them all at once in the back-side yard.
All the way in the back are some Wine Berry (natural and invasive) and I found some
Forsythia and am trying to get them started back there as well.
May 23, 2015

This is a new garden that we just made in April 2015.
There will be new plants coming in August to plant there for next year.

Tomatoes, Yellow, Roma and Beef Steak

Peppers; Yellow, Green and Hot

Purple Bush Beans!  They only took about 5 days to sprout up!
Behind those are my Knock Out Roses and they are
growing super and about to flower in about a week.

Lettuce and Spinach

Zucchini!  I planted this because a neighbor who does not have the sun that I have wanted it.
I also like this in sups and stews in the winter.  It is great added to Beef Stew.

Yellow Straight neck Squash.  I got something that you mix with water and water
the plants that kill the Squash Bug.  I read on the bottle and you can use it for just about anything.
I did and everything is growing lots better.

This is the combination that I used and my gardens are doing so well.  I am amazed!
They are both natural pesticides.
The bag is Diamataceous Earth, that is food grade.
The other is Thuricide and it is natural too.

I hope that you have enjoyed the tour of my gardens and do hope that you get a chance to read all my other garden post and all my other blogs as well.

Until next time!!!

Gardening Journal, May 6, 2015

Gardens from April 28, 2015 to May 6, 2015

I have been so busy and not had the time to write this last Saturday and here is is Wednesday already!

We did lots to our gardens last weekend and I have to show you what we have done.

VEGETABLES

We got some lettuce and spinach plants and planted them on April 28.  This may be a new one for me as I didn't get the right lettuce plants.  I wanted Bib lettuce or loose leaf but instead I got Head Lettuce.  I do not know of any way to put it up or preserve it for later.  The spinach was slow in getting started in the garden here.  I added this cremline fabric so that it keeps the bugs from feasting on my food.  They have lots of food in the woods that they do not have to go munching on mine.  

I also got a couple of different Tomatoes this year.  I got some Yellow and Roma tomatoes and then I also planted some seeds of the Beefsteak tomatoes that should be sprouting any day now.  My neighbor was done using his tomato cages and he gave them to me to use and so I put them over the tomatoes here.  Since April 28 they have doubled in size and the cool nights have gone away now and the warmer days are making these grow like weeds (they were weeds when they were first found in peoples yards).

Peppers are in the bright pink raised garden and I got Green Peppers and some hotter ones.  I am planning on putting them in the sauces that I am going to be using the tomatoes for.  I also want to take some and freeze them for the winter foods that I will be making. These are a bit slower to start.  They have only grown about a inch since I planted them on April 28.

I also planted some cucumber seeds on my front deck to grow on the banisters.  No pictures just yet, but they have finally started to peek out and sprout up.

FLOWERS AND GARDEN BEDS

This was hard work but it looks so good after it is all done.  Oh I have more bulbs coming to plant here in the fall.

About halfway done.  We had to rake all the leaves out of the area that we were going to be planting the transplants here and the bulbs that are coming in the fall.

From about three sets of Daffodils I got about 10 new bulbs to plant. Deer do not like these so I had to plants them around the Hostas that you see in the next picture.

These Hostas were planted in the front garden with my Hyacinths, but did not do well there.  This is as high as they have gotten and they were planted there for about 4 years.  So we moved them and I also got 2 new plants of of each one.  They look really super there int he wooded area with the Bleeding Hearts.

End product, at least for the summer.  Gorgeous!

We may be putting up more of the red boards later, but we much get more paint first.

OTHER AREAS OF THE YARD

My Lilac bloomed this year and this is the first cutting off of it.  They smell so good!  For some reason my lilacs only get blooms every other year.  So when they bloom I have to take advantage of the flowers.

We moved the water pool under the front deck for Duke and the cats to be able to drink from and maybe Duke will get his paws wet when it is sweltering hot outside.  One can only hope!  That is Mikey drinking out of the water hole.

There was a extra Rose stick coming up from the Bigger Climbing Rose on the trellis that we made for it on the left side of the house.  I had an extra large container and we planted that extra Rose in it on the right side.  It is doing really well there right now.  I thought it was a shoot from the other Rose and thought that I would have a problem removing it.  When I dug down into the soil, it was on it's own and not connected to the other Rose at all.  Strange, but things are strange around here anyway.  I added some Rose food to that bigger Climbing Rose as well as added and mixed in with the new Climbing Rose container. 

First mowed lawn of the season!  It smelled so good and I loved the smell of newly cut grass.

Our sign had fallen apart and we were waiting to get more paint and a better board to replace the old one.  So I took one day and made this pink sign and this time I screwed it into the yellow board instead of hanging it.  Yeah hanging it was very pretty but the wind would always knock it off the hooks.  Finally the board just rotted and literally fell apart.  So here is the new and improved sign.  I just love all my bright colors in my yard and gardens.

Do you like bright colors too?

Garden Journal April 27, 2015 We Are Ready!

Gardens, Garden Beds, Plants and Planting Time 

I did a lot of work on the front deck.  We got some Perlite and have been adding that and refreshing all the containers with last years soil in them.  We dumped and added the Perlite into the metal can you see on the right of the picture.  It was easier to mix then doing them separate.  Then we filled up the three green planters on the top of the banisters and I planted some Cascading Begonia bulbs in them.  One of them was already starting to sprout!  They will look nice on the deck in about 3 weeks as they are summer bulbs.  In the cat litter buckets that you see on the left I planted cucumbers and they will trail and grow up on the deck banister in front of them and possibly on the ram banister as well.  I have found that Cucumbers do not mind the part shade and in fact they do produce lots as they did last year.  I suppose the I will be giving some away to my Security Guard in the neighborhood.  Oh I will learn how to pickle this year.  I keep saying that but I do not get enough to make a batch at one time, so I just eat and give away most of them.

In my last Garden Journal I was talking about the Red Bud trees that has just flowered.  Well it has been about 2 weeks now and here is that the one in my backyard looks like.

I also mentioned to some that they grow wild here and here is a picture of how they are growing along the lane.  There are so many of them in our forest that they almost cover the rolling hills with this color.  They do not grow very tall here and they are more like a small tree.  Many have cultivated them in their yards to be bolder in color and the trunks and branches are full and strong looking.

Now you also see my raised gardens here and they are all ready to be planted.  We rototilled the Perlite right into the soil and raked them level.  It was a bit too chilly for the tomatoes and the peppers this weekend.  I am waiting until the night temps are a bit warmer and over 45 degrees.  I will be covering them with some Crenlin fabric that you can buy in the fabric stores and in bulk too.  The tend to do well under that and the good thing about it is that they keep out the bugs, seeds from the tress and other plants and they also keep out the deer.  It must be the look or feel or even the smell that keeps them away from this.

These are what I am planting this year!  I have Yellow Tomatoes and Roma Tomatoes that will go in the Yellow Raised Garden.  I also have Green Pepper and a slightly spicier one and these will go in the  Pink Raised Garden.  I am going to be making some spaghetti sauces with this and maybe try some other things as well.  I also want to make some of those delicious Home-grown Tomatoes on sadwiches.

I love home-made stuff right from my own garden.

I also have some Lettuce and Spinach to plant as well and they will be planted in the Orange raised garden.  I think that I will be planting them today.  Last year I got the seed packets for a mixed seeds of Lettuces and Spinach, but they did not do as well and I also had them planted further back in the yard where we used to have a small deck.  They were expensive! So I got some already grown Lettuce and Spinach.  

I love going out and picking a few leaves and using them on my Hamburgers or fresh salads.  Nothing beats home-grown and home-made!  You know exactly what is put on your foods.

I am seeing a slight problem that we may have around here.  Those while sacks that are on those tree limbs are caterpillars and they eat everything in sight.  We have been burning some of them that we can reach.  These few are on one tree and we cannot reach them.  That tree is going to eaten within a week.  I do hope that it does not kill the tree though.  I was chosen to be a steward to the trees here.  I don't know where this came from but it was just a knowing.  We have taken down many trees that were hollow throughout and re have tired to re-plant, but nothing seems to take except the many acorns that grow into Oaks here.  I have tired nut trees without any success except for the one that is growing good.  The thing is with that one is that I planted 3 of them and the only one has survived, which means there will be no fruit on it once it gets old enough to produce the nuts.  It is the Carpathian Walnut tree.  Oh, well I have tried for a few years.

These are just a few of my plants that have grown up and are gorgeous.  The Bleeding Heart has really come into bloom.  The Tall Phlox, that wasn't happy being in the green planter on my porch and before that in the woods, is now very happy in it's own box.

Speaking about all vegetables and flowers that I have and am planting:  I also like to use plants and vegetables to set off the colors of the planters and rasied gardens.  I love matching the colors to make the yard and landscape pop!

See you next time in my Gardens!

© Debra K. Allen a.k.a Lady Guinevere

I researched and wrote this article. Please do not copy and paste any part of this article, picture included for your own use. I will find you and report you for stealing.  It is my right to change any information therein at any time and/or change the location of my article.