Spring?

So I was pretty sure spring was arriving.  All the signs were there, buds and blooms on tree, crocus, daffodils, and grape hyacinths all blooming.  Things even dried up (almost) enough to mow part of the jungle lawn.  I got my family outside in the yard all at the same time to work on making it presentable.  It was wonderful, even magical.  The beds are still to wet to till or plant in but who cares things are growing!
Then my husband sends me a message.  It says the snow level is dropping to 1000 ft and that we might see some flurries on the valley floor. Crap.  Oh well.  Doesn't matter because I have nothing in the ground yet.  I plan to remedy this next week. Until then stay tuned.

For the Love of Garlic

I have always loved companion planting, my favorite is the Indian trio corn beans and squash. Corn for the height, beans grow up the corn and squash is the ground cover. So I am always open for new ideas and suggestions. I have co-planted with garlic before with strawberries and sometimes basil, then when wondering the best time to plant and harvest is I wandered across this site and found out that lots of plants love garlic. Why? Garlic is a pesticide! Roses, lettuce and cabbage will benefit greatly from some friendly garlic neighbors. They do warn that some plants do not grow well next to garlic, most likely they need the same nutrients in the soil, but garlic oil or essence of garlic can help discourage the bad bugs. This being said I have now decided to plant garlic every where in my garden this year. Garlic is effortless planting, easy to care for, and of course it tastes wonderful and now it will help all the other plants in my garden!

The next step

I turned my compost and walked out my garden plan today, everything seems to fit. Now am ready for the next steps, the actual doing in the garden. so I created a list.
1) buy plastic for green house
2) put up green house (have the other stuff)
3) inventory seeds
4) FERTILIZER! that is make a run to the family farm to collect the black gold.
5) mix my potting soil (parts: old potting soil/new top soil/goat compost)
6) Plant!

I plan on planting some peas, herbs and lettuce in new green house.

So this is my rough garden plan, the large rectangles are straw bales and everything else is pots.

Starting Over (again)

So a new year a new house and a new garden. Last year I had a postage stamp yard and very little good sunlight. So I potted most everything and everyone had company. Then I moved at the end of August (I hope the new tenants enjoyed my strawberries) and had to leave most of it. I end up with one box of strawberries and garlic, one pot of marigolds and a whole lot of empties. My first goal is to decide what, where and how to plant my new garden. Planting in the ground is not a option, I have a four inch layer of bark-dust then a rock clay combo so hard it killed on of my shovels. I also have to put in writing any request for permanent structures to the rental company, so beds my or my not be an option. This has me leaning toward pots, with heavily composted areas or straw bale beds. I like the straw bed gardening because any mess can just be put in my curb side composting bin. This less construction, less mess and more control over were I put them.

The New Year

Time to start at the beginning.  Well not really the beginning we had a garden last year and the year before but last year most of the garden was volunteer from the year before.
We have raised beds because our soil is rock and sand.  And everything that was in the garden this summer is still in the garden this winter.  I wasn't even thinking about doing anything in it until spring.  
Then my mom got me a new book Delia's Kitchen Garden and my sister said let's start working on each others gardens together.  And then somehow the idea to blog it came around so here we are starting a blog together.

So my first goals (one from the book and one from necessity and one from shame) are to turn my soil in my beds, rake up the leaves in my front yard and prune back my roses.