My very first garden

We have been at our first home for two year now and have mostly focused on the inside. The pandemic has made us realize how important the back yard is. The first thing we did was focus on things for the kids to do in the yard. Our first summer here we built a rock box for them to dig and get dirty in. (My husband hates it but the kids LOVE it) Next, we got a swing set that only took about 16 hours to assemble. Honestly, it might have been faster to build it from scratch.

This summer is my summer! I am so excited to finally be able to have a garden. When I was a kid I can remember playing outside with my sisters and when we got hungry we would just go into the garden and start snacking on the veggies. I loved helping my mom harvest the goodies from the garden and I want that for my kids.

After doing some research and getting everyone's opinion on what we should grow I went to the store to get some seeds to start indoors. With all of my seeds and supplies ready I watched the videos from #floretflower one more time to make sure I knew what I was doing. A nice day came along and outside we went to start our very first garden. I am not a big fan of wearing gloves I find it difficult to do things and I like to be able to feel the texture of things. So, I always spray my hands and the kids hands with some clear shield to help protect them when gardening. With some help from the four youngest kids we got all of our seeds planted in the starter pots.

After doing this I started to plan where to put my raised garden bed

and checking Pinterest for different ideas as to how to make one. I had some ideas that I had planned on trying but was a little overwhelmed. While at Costco we saw a 4x4 raised garden bed kit that could be arranged a couple of ways. My husband quickly said this was the way to go. It was really easy to set up and put together. Filled it with soil and the the kids and dog promptly started walking through it. So now we need a fence if anything is going to survive our kids and dog.

While waiting for my husband to come back from the store with some kind of fence I started to plan out where all my little seedlings were going to go. This turned out to be more stressful then I thought it would be. Turns out some plants don't get along and some grow better when next to certain plants. Because this is my first real garden I felt like the square foot method was going to be easiest for me to handle.

I got out some left over string from our crab traps from last summer and some scotch tape. Next I started to lay out my square foot areas. My son, Joey, really enjoyed this part he said "it's like making a map." and I was like oh did you learn about maps at school? He goes "No, I use a map when I play Fortnight. Duh." Here I thought he only learned goofy new dances from Fortnight. Who knew it was actually a geography lesson.

The next day we got the fence up and I used some paper plates to mark where each of the groups of seedlings would go. The kids helped me transplant our seedlings to their new home. Now we just wait. I will update Soon.

Update!!!

What I have learned.

1. Square foot gardening is not for me.

2. Make sure your seedlings are labeled and there is no way that your toddler can rearrange all the labels.

3. Make sure you know how big your plants are going to get. Some of the plants got so big they blocks some of the smaller plants from getting sun.

4. I used a horseshoe shape for my raised garden bed and I could not reach some of the plants on the sides because I did not have access to all sides of the horseshoe.

So next year I will take what I have learned and have an even better vegetable and flower garden.