Starting the garden 2010

This past winter the neighbor across the street from my work put a pile of 'scrap' wood out with a Free sign on it.  My good friend and co-worker Mo, who knew I was looking for some wood to build a new raised bed in my front yard, alerted me to the stash.  I drove around to load up my car and was happy to find out that it was all old beautiful Redwood, and nice long pieces too.    A few days later I rented a circular saw from Don's and and we made this great 10' x 4.5' box on the West side of the house and filled it with soil.  I had a couple of strawberry plants that had outgrown their pots so I transplanted them and waited out the winter.

Here's a picture of Bacon hanging out in the sun next to the new bed.

Finally, Spring is here!!  Well, today is the 1st day and we already have seeds going. A few weeks ago I went to the store and bought some seed.  I decided to try to buy all heirloom, but ended up with some organics and few Squirrel's Choice, which aren't organic, or heirloom from what I can tell,  but are varieties that are suppose to grow well in the West.  I got a few flowers, nasturtium and sweet peas, to plant along the fence and have to for bouquets for the house along with a bunch of vegies for the bed.

Heirloom

Melting Sugar Peas (Chinese)

Early Snowball Cauliflower

Genovese Basil

Fairytale Pumpkin

De Cicco Broccoli

Black Valentine Bush Beans

Bloomingdale Long Standing Spinach

Organic

Sweetie Tomotoes (cherry)

Squirrel's Choice

Sweet Meat Winter Squash

Bush Peas

Italian Flat Parsley

Cilantro

Lettuce Mix

He-Shi-Ko Green Onions

Davers Half Long Carrots

And we got a few bulbs too - a Black Forest Calla, Emily McKenzie Crococmia and some rhubarb.

I used some recycled egg crates and starting mix for the seed starts.

I lined the separated tops with plastic grocery bags and used them as liners for the bottom.  They also doubled as mini green houses once the seeds were planted and I covered the crates with the bags.

I got the bright idea, from something I read on the internet, I'm sure, to use the bed-in-a-bag bag as a greenhouse for some of the starts.



Jillian was a great help for the whole project!  It was a nice sunny day so we sat in the sun and made labels for the starter trays.



So once we got seeds in the trays, watered and labeled we set some up in the window in the dining room where there are four big West facing windows and the other ones in my makeshift greenhouse we set on top of the bed that will soon be their permanent home.



It was a very satisfying day and we really enjoyed ourselves working together on our garden.
It's been a few weeks and we certainly have some growth to be excited about...reports and pictures to come!