How Does Your Garden Grow??

Lol! we are going to try it again this year. We shall see how it goes. Over the last couple of years we have tried different things. The first year I picked a poor spot and the plants didn't get enough light. Last year, I started the plants but they never got in the ground. This year we went with Sq. Foot Gardening.

First, we built two of these boxes. It took DH a long afternoon to get them both built, but it was worth it! Then it came time to plant our seedlings.




The thing with this type of garden is that it saves space. In a traditional "dug bed" you need a foot wide space the length of one row, two feet of space for walking (the length of your row) and then another foot for your next row. Let's say you are going to plant 64 plants that need a foot of space each. You would need a dug bed that is 8' X 22'. (That's 8 plants per row, 8 rows) That works out to 176 sq.' total. We planted the same amount of plants in only 64 sq' using the boxes!! That's almost a third of the space! Can you imagine?!

Since the boxes are 4' wide, I can reach in from either side without straining. Another advantage is that I don't have to bend over as far to weed or reach the plants at harvest time! Win win! I do wish I could say that I didn't have to weed them at all but alas, that is not the case. What I will say is that weeding is MUCH easier since there are fewer weeds, and they are not well established.

I hope you will give this a try. There is the initial investment of materials, but I think it will pay for itself in the first year. We bought all the materials and even the dirt mixture and spent (roughly) $150. We will not need to make such an investment next year so our garden ill only cost us seeds. My plan (we all know how plans can go...lol) is to dry seeds from the best of our plants from this year for next year. That will help with the cost and should be a fun learning experience for both myself and the kids!

Have a blessed day!!

TTFN,
Me