What I Did This Weekend: Part 1

Marigolds keep pests away.

Seedlings transported to larger pots

Ah, a wonderful 80 degree weekend, what ever will I do?  Catch up on my gardening to do list!  First up, the potted plants.  I planted a basil plant, three marigolds to keep pests from my other potted plants, four fruit trees (more on them later), and one GIANT pot that is a mix of red/yellow/white onions and purple haze carrots.  After that I went ahead and moved my seedlings to larger pots.  See my economical use of those old, cheap, plastic pots I got my strawberries in?

 

Poor hoe...

 Next up, I got to hoeing the first portion of my raised garden bed to be planted.  I hoe so good I broke it.  No, for reals.  I broke the hoe.  After trying to hand-hoe for a bit with the top of the broken hoe, I gave up and went back to my mom's favorite method of breaking up the soil to make it loose for planting...a shovel.  Man, kinda time consuming...but I will admit, it works much better and goes much deeper than a hoe.  Jump on shovel til it goes deep, jimmy/crowbar it up, spear the giant clod of dirt into smaller bits.  There are so many "that's what she said"s available in this paragraph.  You're Welcome.

Can't see grooves, but you can see 1 planted and 1 grid onions

But moving on, once the area was loose soil, I gridded out my spot by making little grooves with my hands.  The bed area is 4x5'.  So I did 1 row of rainbow chard, one row of carrots, three 1x2' grids of onions (red, yellow, and white), and then the grids opposite the onions with different salad greens (butter beauty, a gourmet blend, and baby leaf spinach).  As I planted each area I covered it with either top soil because I have a ton leftover, or potting soil.  This way I could easily see each grid where I'd already planted.  I then watered with a lovely mist spray, you don't want a jet spray on seeds because it can knock them out of place.  Be gentle!  Onions can probably take whatever you throw at them, but why be mean?

Thumb Peas, mmmmm

Here's hoping it doesn't rain tomorrow and I can get another 4x5' bed planted!  And as a special treat, look at how well my Thumb Peas are doing!