Independence Homestead

Yard When We First Settled Here

We moved into Independence Homestead at the beginning of the summer in 2011, so almost a year ago.  Last year was spent improving the inside of the house and settling in.   While we did routine maintenance on the yard, that’s about all we did outside.  The prior owners were obviously not gardeners, so we started with a pretty minimal setup.  In the backyard there was lawn, an evergreen tree, and a rosebush.  None of that was maintained.   The positive aspect to this situation is that we are starting with pretty much a blank slate.  We can create whatever we want!

Last year as the leaves were falling, we decided that we would create garden beds along the fence around the yard.  We would keep the center as grassy lawn.  In the areas that we were changing into beds, we turned up the dirt and buried all the leaves we raked up.  Over the winter these leaves have decomposed, enriching the soil with organic matter.

First Section of New Garden Bed

Last fall as we were burying the leaves, we also bought some bricks off of Craigslist.  We set these bricks in the ground to edge our beds.  George would dig up the dirt with a shovel, and I would go along fine-tuning the area with a trowel, and setting in the bricks.  The bricks settled a lot after this, and some ended up sitting a little lower than we would have liked.  It’s not bad enough for us to fix, just keep in mind that if you’re going to edge with bricks, leave them a little higher than you want them to be.  They’ll lower over time.

Garden Edging Fence

In the spring we realized that the bricks looked nice, but they did nothing to keep our dogs out of the garden.  So we improved the edge of our garden by getting white garden fencing from the local home and garden store.  It came in a metal roll, and we rolled it out, and stuck the stakes on it into the ground.  It’s only about a foot high, but it makes the garden look more situated, and with some dog training it has been sufficient to keep the dogs out of the yard.

In about February we got the itch to start thinking out the garden we’d have.  We knew we should start seeds inside so that we could get an early start on the garden.  Well, we started our herb seeds first in several pots.  While having herbs is great, this wasn’t the smartest strategic move for us as we don’t plan on putting the herbs out in the garden.  They’ll be container plants that live inside.  This way we’ll have them available year-round.  So now we have a lot of herbs, but none of those are going outside.

This winter was unseasonably mild, so in March our next gardening move was to plant some cool weather plants outside.  We knew that it wasn’t likely to freeze again, so the timing was perfect.  Again, though, I didn’t think out the planning as much as I should have.  We decided to plant the seeds on an impulse, so we hadn’t prepared with row markers.  So I decided what seeds to plant, created rows in the dirt, and planted the seeds.  I kind of used sticks to mark the ends of the rows, but nothing indicated what was planted there.  That was not smart.  When plants started sprouting, we had no idea what they were.  That makes weeding a pain.

I learned from this experience, though, and we now use row markers all the time.  Some row markers have been made from cut up plastic food containers.  We just cut them into rectangles, and use a marker to write out the plant name.  We also picked up popsicle sticks at the dollar store, and they make great row markers.  I’ve heard people use the handles from plastic tableware, but we don’t use plastic tableware, so that wouldn’t work for us.

Since March we have been planting seeds with inside in pots, or outside in garden every week or two.  By staggering our planting we are also staggering our harvest.   Most of the seeds have been sprouting, although the germination rate of some older seeds is quite low.  With those we just plant more seeds if nothing’s sprouted in a couple weeks, and we plant a greater number of them.

Freshly Weeded Section of Garden

The garden can be a lot of work, especially the weeding.  I know that this will be the most difficult year, though, we we’re starting from scratch.  Every time we plant a perennial or a bulb, I know we’re laying the foundation to the garden, and we won’t have to do that work again.

Look forward to more posts about the specifics of what we’re doing in the garden, and what works and what doesn’t.