This year, we're trying something different for our vegetable garden. Our previous attempts have produced a few dozen tomatoes, a plethora of zucchini, and lots and lots of weeds. In fact, I believe the weed count in our backyard outnumbers the plants down to the individual blades of grass!
This year, we wanted to maximize our return on veggies with a minimum of time (as I have no doubt my time will be limited with a new baby). So we decided to try a square foot garden! The basic concept is you plant one crop per square foot, increasing the yield in a small space. So this weekend, we spent time building a 2x8 box for climbing veggies, and a 4x4 box for our other veggies. We also went shopping and picked up the soil mix, though we did not follow the book's recipe exactly. Instead, we got several bags of compost, a bag of peat moss, 2 bags of top soil, and 2 small bags of vermiculite (we couldn't find the large ones). I'm hoping that doesn't affect our results, but we'll see!
After building the boxes, I put my husband to work removing the grass in the spot we chose - this way our garden will actually get multiple hours of sunlight! The kids, upon waking from their naps, were all too eager to jump in and pull up grass too!
Fortunately, we didn't get to start planting - Michigan is supposed to get snow this week! J and M keep asking when they get to plant their seeds. They're really excited about the garden this year, which I hope will translate into being excited about eating the veggies we grow!
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