garden montage

the only picture i could find of my first attempt, garden 2006. its the the little box way off to the right. 16X16 if i remember right... zucchini (i won't ever start 2 plants again....ever!), tomatoes, cucumber and carrots. it was such a nice summer and i grew so many vegetables. we weren't too sure i would even be able to grow vegetables out at the beach. thomas caught onto my garden fever and we decided it needed to be bigger. so we expanded by adding a second 16X16 square. unfortunately, i can't find any pictures, but i think it was the first year i planted corn.

**WARNING** this is a scrolling nightmare...i apologize, but its worth it :)

garden 2008 doesn't have many pictures either, this was before we felt the need to picture document anything, good thing my sister lived with us and did. this year lettuce, rosemary, onions, broccoli and peas made their debut:

peas

lettuce

broccoli 

garden 2009 was planted (with pictures soon to follow), and very successful. since that was going so well, we decided to focus our efforts on other outside projects. thomas fell through a board on the deck...yep, fell through the deck. instead of replacing that one board we decided to replace all the boards...railing, removal of the upper portion of the deck, replace with stone patio, add pergola and 2 flower beds. the progress went something like this:

before we got all crazy.

and this is how it all started. those nice white railings started to rot...even
though i labored every summer over re-painting.

we drove right into the rest of the deck, deciding to completely remove the entire upper part of the deck (the whole portion to the right). in place of more decking, we built a pergola (with help) and put in a patio.

 you can see one of the gardens behind me and the gigantic mess we made.

even moka braved the heat to supervise.

then the pergola went up. you can see the gardens to the right. 

 next the patio with the lavender and rosemary planter behind.

 the gardens were great that year, one of the best. 

and i continued to get a good amount of veggies all summer long. 

after the great deck project of 2009, garden 2010 became our main focus. it happened to be a great spring and we were able to get outside pretty early in the year and finish the garden assembly before thomas disappeared to his yearly spring work extravaganza. 

 i worked on expanding the flower bed to boarder the other side of the patio while 

thomas measured twice and cut...twice.

 the last look at our two gardens. 

 then the two became one with the start of a green house. 

 finally done and ready to plant. 

and i did, by mid march i was planting.

 may

and continued to grow with a great production.

garden 2011 promises to be even better. every year i get better and experiment more with plant combinations. we were able to expand the greenhouse and start a new strawberry bed before thomas disappeared. unfortunately, the weather has not been great at all. its been about 10 degrees colder than normal so only the asparagus (which won't produce anything until next year), horseradish and strawberries relocated. 

 strawberry bed

 expanded greenhouse

 asparagus bed

horseradish and soon-to-bed rhubarb bed behind the garlic.

i am hoping to plant the rest of the garden in the next few weeks...weather permitting, see above post. since i have taken over the old camera and now have one of my own i am hoping to take better progress pictures....so more to come!