This is How My Garden Grows (May 2013 Update)

I have been so busy lately that I have been horrible at weeding my garden, and planting seeds this spring. Thankfully rhubarb doesn't take much care so I already made a rhubarb pie!

The raspberries are trying to take over the whole garden area. I've been pulling shoots out of every section lately. The bees are busy pollinating, which is what I like to see! There are already too many berries starting to grow that I can't count them all. :) In the picture, don't mind the patch of dandilions that currently occupy the raised bed.

This year I'm trying out those Topsy Turvy tomato growers. I hope that having them in a sunnier spot will produce more red tomatoes instead of being left with a bunch of green tomatoes in the fall. A bonus is that while out for a walk around the neighborhood a couple weeks ago, I found a table with FREE tomato starts! I'm Dutch, so anything free is awesome!

Another new addition to my garden this year is the strawberry tower. I got the idea when I was on a field trip to Seattle Tilth with my pre-k class. I figured it would be easy enough to DIY so I drew a mock up on Google SketchUp first, and then handed the plans over to my Dad. Thanks to Stacy for the strawberry starts to put in it! I'll transplant the rest of my strawberry plants after they finish producing fruit this summer.

Last but certainly not least, is my flower bed. Which has actually been getting more attention lately than the garden. I noticed dahlia shoots coming up so I weeded around them. I had to cut/pull out some of the vinca ground cover to give the dahlias and iris more space to grow! I aslo took out the sticks that were supposedly supporting them as they grew, and replaced them with tomato cages since I won't be needing those this summer. A nice addition of rabbit poop fertilizer, and they're growing wonderfully. Now if only the slugs would stay away from them. :(

I'm hoping that blogging about my garden gives me more motivation to finish weeding so I can plant more. What have you planted in your garden this spring? What would you like to grow in your garden?

June Garden Update

It's been since May & April when I last posted about my garden. Everything has grown a lot since then. Check out these pictures to see for yourself:

Big picture view of raised bed, raspberries, small bed, blueberries.

 Close up of the two new blueberry bushes I planted. Finally dug up the lemon balm, and added a few friends for my lonely blueberry bush.

Raised bed: 2 tomatoes, 3 bush beans, 2 corn, & chives. In front is carrots, swiss chard, & kale. I'll post about making kale chips later. :) Look at that raspberry patch! I picked the first 4 berries off it today, & they were SO yummy!!

Big picture of the left side of the garden. Look how tall those peas are...taller than my 5'1" that's for sure!

A better view not looking through the peas. It's hard to see, but in the middle is mystery squash (note the 4 garden labels). After the wind blew over my green house these are the squash that came up, & we'll see what they produce. This also gives a good picture of the soaker hoses I finally got out of the shed.

Here's a better view of the spinach, & leaf lettuce that were in the shade of the last picture. They look a little thin because I picked some for salad. :) Might I add that it was delicious salad!

This is the "small" garden off to the side of the raspberry patch. Sadly my radishes have all bolted. :( On the other hand that one cabbage is doing great!

The flower bed by the house is looking a lot better since the April post. Mostly due to the fact that I've been working on weeding it. My dahlias are coming up! The fenced in plant has decided to grow super tall this year. :/ Like the peas it's taller than my 5'1", and continues to grow!

Thanks for taking a peek at my growing garden! Sorry that the pictures are not the best quality since I took them with my iPod touch (I have seemed to misplace my regular camera).