~* Adventures in Gardening 2010, Part 3 *~

[all pictures in this post taken at various times over the past 3 days]

Click here for Part 1 and here for Part 2 

Everything that is going to be planted is now planted! The above picture is the main garden. This was taken near the end of the day, which is why it is completely shaded. Our garden gets it's sun in the first half of the day.

Just to re-cap, we planted the following:

* tomatoes: cherry, roma, celebrity

* peppers: jalapeno, cayenne, red bell, cubanelle

* zucchini

* cucumbers

* string beans

* carrots

* white onions

* romaine lettuce

* strawberries

* herbs: basil, italian parsley, sage, thyme, lavender, cilantro, chives, rosemary, nasturtium, mint

I think I previously posted that I planted Greek oregano, one of my most favorite herbs. and I would swear up and down I bought a plant. Damned if I know where it is... Seriously, I tore the yard apart looking for it. So as of now I do not have oregano planted. My parents have planted some so I may just forego it this year...or I will end up at the garden center this weekend hoping I can still get a plant...

See those teeny tiny bits of green? Those are carrots starting to sprout! I have learned that once they fill in a bit more I have to thin them out. Basically that means I have to remove perfectly good seedlings from my garden so as not to crowd the carrots that are growing underground and ending up with mutant veggies. This ought to be interesting. We planted our carrots from seed. When I tore open the package we were not prepared by how teeny tiny and wispy carrot seeds are. So we kind of, uh, just dumped pinches of them in each hole. A pinch of carrot seeds could easily be ten or fifteen seeds...

Those are our string beans starting to sprout. I think I took this pic on Sunday and today they are already quite a bit bigger! I am realizing (and I have been told over and over) that we will either have to find a way to make our chicken wire bean support contraption taller or replace it with a a proper trellis.

In the above shot you can see several of our pepper plants. The largest of the plants within the supports is our cucumber plant and behind that is our zucchini plant. We have been told that you can train any type of vine vegetable to grow up, which is what we intend to do. We have such a small space and they just spread so much last year. In the above pic you can also see two of the three tomato varieties: cherry in the top corner and celebrity in the middle. You can kinda get a glimpse of the romas in the bottom corner.

This is on the other side of the veggie garden. The pots you see are, from front to back, pansies in the two front pots (I planted these way back in early spring and I am thrilled with how full and lush they still are!), the second row in the terra cotta pot is lavender and in the cedar planter is nasturtium, the third row in the pot with the flag is a pepper plant* and next to it is a tomato plant*, the fourth row the front pot is another tomato plant* and the back pot is a strawberry plant, and the fifth row both pots are strawberries with a couple little strawberry plants in the ground in between them.

* About those pepper and tomato plants in the pots....we have no idea which variety they are! We had already planted others in the garden and added the little stakes with the info in the dirt over there so we could identify things till I made some plant stakes. So when we went to add things to pots we had no idea what was what! That is just how we roll, it seems....

I guess we will be surprised later this summer!

Here is our little deck herb garden!

The first pot is rosemary. Then a small pot of impatiens, our cute little froggie couple and another pot of impatiens. The cedar planter is filled with parsley and sage.

The square pot next to the cedar planter contains chives. The small pot next to that is thyme. The pot that is boosted up a bit contains cilantro, and the last pot is mint.

I saved the BIG planter for basil! Lots and lots and lots of fragrant basil!

Our deck smells heavenly.

I just love fresh herbs. There is nothing like cooking with them. So much better than the dried stuff you get at the store!

I can't wait to make lots of sauces and salsas and marinades loaded with fresh herb-y goodness!

And they are just really pretty to look at!

LOVE the scent of lavender! So soothing and calming! Maybe I will make some sweet sachets!

Just a wider shot of the deck. Aren't barn stars the best? I just love barn stars. I especially love this big red one we have. We have had it a few years now and I love the weathered patina it has formed. Those cute little hanging baskets on either side of our sliders are filled with impatiens. I love the ease of maintenance with impatiens.

And who doesn't love fresh, sweet strawberries?! Our strawberry plants are producing like crazy this year and we are thrilled! Last year we got some. This year we have already gotten more in these past few weeks than we got all season last year!

Red, juicy, drippy, sweet deliciousness!

I would like to get a whole bunch at once and make a yummy summery dessert with them!

In other gardening news, we finally purchased some shrubs and ornamental grasses for the bed in front of the house! And we planted a beautiful hydrangea on the hill next to our shed. I don't have any pictures of these yet, but I will get some soon. The front planting bed won't look so great though with the shrubs and grasses being such young plantings. Our hope is that the back-breaking work of these past few weeks will pay off a few years down the road. I didn't get to planting any perennials this year. And I know there is still plenty of time to do that, and we may still plant some, but we have probably single-handedly kept Home Depot and a few of our local garden centers in the black for the year! And we are physically feeling it all, too. It will be nice to have a weekend that doesn't involve anything more than a bit of weeding and watering.

What I plan to do and what I actually do very rarely seem to be the same thing, so the next update could have a while boatload of info on other projects we tackled...or it could be a nice update of how what is now planted is growing along with some pretty pictures.

Hmmm....which will it be...?

NOTE: I have added a link list on my left sidebar near the top of the page with all 2010 gardening posts. I will add to it as I add more posts.