Summer progress in Illinois

Posted on July 20, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Sarah is back today with more news from Illinois. Like me, she has a long summer to-do list, and she’s made some good progress recently.

Things have been pretty busy around here.

This past weekend Steve and I spent over 4 hours trying to get the garden back in shape. Weeds had really gotten ahead of us.

It’s crazy how a good rain and warm sunny weather for a couple days can turn weeds from “manageable” to “out of control,” because that is exactly what happened. But we do now have a handle on things, and I need to work on it every day, even for just a few minutes, so that we stay on top of things.

The rain and sun has been great for the kale though. I have added it to my salads, and I have made some kale chips. But truthfully I really needed to find a way to use more of it and quickly.

I was listening to Young House Love’s podcast, and John mentioned that he blends his kale with just a little bit of water and freezes it in ice cube trays. Then he uses a cube or two to drop in his smoothies. Wow! That was such a simple idea and I had never thought of that or read that idea anywhere. So I cut a bunch of kale, rinsed it and did exactly what John suggested.

I used a lot of my kale. It only took a few minutes and now I can add it easily to my breakfast.

I will have more to harvest. This is AFTER I made my kale cubes.

The other thing that we worked on over the weekend was the chicken coop.

We had just been using wood that we had laying around, but we got to a point where we had to make a run to the home improvement store and get more supplies.

We are basically making a small room inside one of our barns. The exterior wall and the roof will be insulated.

I am still kind of designing and redesigning things as we go, but I have a pretty good plan in mind. I am hoping we will be ready for chickens by the end of this upcoming weekend.

This summer seems to be flying by so quickly. We have gotten so much done, but I feel like I have so much more that I really want to get finished.

I don’t want another month to go by without checking so much more off of my to-do list!

Oh, I know what you mean, Sarah. Summer is the time to get things done. I’m glad I’m not the only one with an ambitious to-do list. You’re doing a really great job, though! I can’t wait to see the rest of the coop–and its occupants.

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Home Goals 2016 mid-year report

Posted on July 4, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Six months ago, I shared my Home Goals for 2016. We just crossed the halfway point of the year, so it’s time for my mid-term report.

Beyond sharing my Home Goals, I also started the year by sharing some of my ideas for the major renovation that we want to do… someday. And the first goal on the list was to get an idea of how much the reno is going to cost to help us figure out when that someday might be.

We consulted with a contractor, got some feedback on our plans and got some numbers. They’re big numbers… as in not any time soon numbers… but it was helpful to give us an idea of where we’re at.

In terms of specific projects, here are the rest of our goals.

Guest room

The guest room was our first project of the year, and I’ve already done the official “reveal,” so I’m feeling pretty good about crossing this project off. However, there’s one task left on my original to-do list, which has also made it onto my summer to-do list.

~~Paint the walls and trim~~
~~Replace the light fixture~~
~~Make window treatments~~
~~Refinish the desk chair~~
Strip the paint off the metal bedframe (and maybe repaint)
~~Decorate and personalize~~

Finish the basement

The basement was essentially finished a looong time ago. However, those niggly finishing details are still hanging around. Plus, we have two new summer projects, one that you know about and one that you don’t yet. (I’ll be talking more next week about things that are going to affect our basement progress).

Trim around the cold cellar doorway
Finish the built-in storage area in Matt’s bathroom
Make/buy art to finish off the space
~~Build shelving in the closet under the stairs~~
NEW Build a new closet in the basement
NEW Mystery project (more to come next week)

Furniture

I’m always on the hunt for a few key pieces of furniture. So far this year, I’ve found one piece–the china cabinet for my office–but it’s still awaiting its makeover.

~~China cabinet for my office~~
Coffee table for the living room
Reupholster slipper chair for my office

Vegetable garden

My all-consuming summer project every year has become the vegetable garden. Thanks to Dueling DIY this spring, the garden is in really good shape.

~~Hang the gate~~
~~Edge the garden~~
~~Build raised beds around the perimeter~~
~~Build trellises for the raspberries, tomatoes and squashes~~
~~Plant perennials: grapes, asparagus, rhubarb, more raspberries~~
Run a waterline out to the garden
NEW Spread hay mulch over the garden

Outdoor clean-up

I ambitiously added another outdoor goal to the list, although I realized I’d have to pick my battles in terms of which area I chose to clean up.

Thanks to a bit of distraction at the start of the garden Dueling DIY, I’ve cleaned up the large lumber pile on the north side of the centre field and burned the long grass and weeds on the south side of the garden. Matt’s been mowing the burn, and it almost looks like a real lawn already.

I’m feeling pretty good about what we’ve accomplished so far. Work on a farm never ends, but I love seeing the progress we’ve made.

How are things going at your house? Do you feel like you’re making progress on your goals?

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Garden at the end of June

Posted on June 29, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Much progress has been made on the garden. You might notice in the photo above that we have a gate! And it’s not just propped in place. It’s actually on hinges, and it swings and everything. It’s only been 10 months since I built the gate. Not at all unreasonable to wait that long to fully protect the garden, right?

Inside, things are slowly filling in. I’m trying to remind myself to be patient and things will grow… eventually.

Let me take you on a tour of around our garden as it’s growing right now.

Quadrant one is our most well-established. It is home to five rows of potatoes–three red, one Kennebec and one Russian Blue. Although I really could have done two Russian Blues given how many we had and how much space there is in this quadrant. There are also three zucchini plants. Then in the perimeter beds there are onions, beets, carrots and a selection of herbs.

I’m a bit disappointed in the onions. They are spindly, some of the ends are brown, and I’m not confident that they’re going to size up. But I keep watering them and sowing new rows for my attempt at succession planting. (The beets in the background are doing excellent, however).

Quadrant two is bordered by our perennial crops: raspberries, grapes and asparagus. The middle is empty however, and we don’t have plans to plant anything here. One of the things I’ve realized is that we can only handle so much with this large vegetable garden.

The asparagus isn’t that much farther along than the onions, but I’m beyond excited by it. I’m trying to grow asparagus from seeds, and I thought I wasn’t going to be successful. These seeds took so long to sprout. Almost three weeks. I thought it wasn’t going to happen. So these little tiny ferns are tremendous progress.

Quadrant 3 has a lot of growth, but not the kind I want. Welcome to weed central. Ugh. There are some watermelon seedlings in here, but I’m not sure they’ll last that much longer without some defense. The outside edge has our sunflowers which are growing incredibly.

Quadrant four is slightly better than weed central, but not by much. This is our first year planting this half of the garden, so it’s taking more effort to clear out the weeds on this side. In this quarter we have two rows of tomatoes (under the wood frames), one of peppers, one of beans and three more zucchini plants. The outer edge has some more herbs, more sunflowers and our hollyhocks.

You’ve caught glimpses of the centre axis already, but here’s the view that I’ve been working towards for the past two years. A long look between our two rows of raspberries, through the squash A-frame and out to the back fields.

On Monday I posted about vision. The vision for this vegetable garden has been a long time coming, but it’s oh so wonderful to see it come to life.

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Garden in June

Posted on June 15, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Every night when I get home from work, I walk through the garden. It’s one of my favourite times of the day–outside at the farm, seeing what’s grown during the day, appreciating all of the hard work we’ve done so far.

The garden is finally taking shape as I’ve envisioned it would from the start–as in years.

Sprouts are growing, from hollyhocks to beets to onions and sunflowers.

Some of the plants have gone beyond sprouting and moved onto blossoming.

There are even signs of fruit on the raspberries and grapes–although I’m working myself up to picking the grapes, as the vines are supposed to focus on growing, not fruiting yet.

I’ve planted herbs all around the perimeter, lavender, thyme, sage, rosemary, basil.

The biggest progress since my final Dueling DIY update are the trellises for the squash, raspberries and tomatoes. I’ll go into more detail on each of these as we go through the season, but here are a few snapshots for now.

The tomatoes are planted under a simple 2×2 wood frame. I’ll add strings once the tomatoes grow a bit more.

Matt hammered 12 steel T-posts around the 2 rows of raspberries. I still need to string wire between each post to hold the raspberries upright, but the hard work was definitely the posts. So much hammering.

The biggest addition is our squash trellis. Fingers crossed this works to corral the squash. We have a big garden, but I learned last year that it was no match for squash.

We have a few more tasks to do before we can officially move into maintenance mode: hang the gate and spread the straw for our deep mulch experiment.

But for now, I’m enjoying my evening walks and seeing the growth so far.

What’s growing at your house?

June garden update

Posted on June 8, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Sarah’s last post was her final report in our Dueling DIY garden challenge. She’s back today to share how her vegetable garden–and a couple of other things–are growing.

I thought I’d take this time to give a garden update. We have had an unusually cool start to spring and that means several of my plants got a late start. Thankfully though the temperatures have been rising and our garden is really starting to catch up. I will give a quick rundown of most of my crops. (Note: We got 1.5 inches of rain the day before I took the pictures below.)

Asparagus

This is my first time raising asparagus so I really don’t know what to expect. I know that the first year or so I am just supposed to let them grow and that’s what I’ve done. Most of the plants don’t look very good, but maybe next year they will grow back even better. I am just using a wait and see method.

Brussels Sprouts

One of the plants that got a late start. I am hoping they recover quickly.

Carrots

At this point I can say that the tops look really good. Hopefully it is looking just as good underground.

Cucumber

Also got a late start but really seems to be recovering. I planted 4 pickling cucumbers that didn’t make it though. That is disappointing.

Kale

I have planted 3 varieties. And they have all taken off like crazy. I have picked some for salads, but I am ready to make some kale chips this week.

Leaf lettuce

Even with a late start, our lettuce looks healthy, and I have picked a few salads worth so far.

Peppers

We have green peppers, red peppers, jalapeno and several other varieties. The plants are all fairly small at this point so I hope they take off soon.

Potatoes

We have planted both a traditional russet and a thin skinned red potato. Like the carrots, the tops look great. I hope that means good things are happening in the ground too.

Onions

The onions are very healthy. We really need to add them to more of our dishes so they don’t go to waste.

Radishes

Note for next year… plant less radishes. Seriously, we planted way too many and I am afraid they will go to waste. Anyone have any recipes or suggestions other than putting them in our salads?

From right to left: lettuce, radishes, green beans, cabbage and potatoes

Rhubarb

Also my first year for rhubarb. When I first put it in the ground I was worried that it wouldn’t make it. Several leaves died off. But this week I noticed two really healthy new leaves so I think it is on the mend.

Spaghetti Squash

The plants are looking great! I have left plenty of room around them to plant pumpkins hopefully in the next week or two.

Strawberries

The plants look very healthy. This is one crop that Steve really wants to expand on next year, so we may have to add on to our garden again!

Sugar Snap Peas

Probably my favorite plant of the garden. I usually eat them before they even make it into the house. This is one plant that prefers cooler weather so I hope that I see some pods before it gets too hot here.

Tomatoes

Definitely our most used crop around here. Besides eating them straight out of the garden my mother-in-law cans tomato juice, and I plan to make salsa and pico de gallo. So it is a good thing that we have plans for them because I have planted 24 plants!

Actually, the plants that I started from seed are finally looking healthy enough to transplant so we will be nearing 30 plants.

They are all different sizes so I am hoping they ripen at all different times!

I have a few things that I am still hoping to plant, but I am very happy that our garden is really looking great this year.

We do have two more things that we are growing around here:

Jan asked for an update, and I am always happy to spend more time with these two before I find them new homes.

They turned 5 weeks as I write this, so we have another week or two before they are ready to leave. They are eating dry food pretty well and they are definitely becoming more active.

If anyone from my area is reading this, I am still looking for homes for them if you are interested!

Ahh. Super cute, Sarah. Too bad Illinois is a bit far away, because Ralph could use a sidekick. Congrats on the garden growth. Things are looking promising.

Dueling DIY – The Final Update

Posted on May 27, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Six weeks ago when I launched this Dueling DIY adventure, I thought, “I got this. No problem. I’ve got six weeks! Sarah’s going down.”

I had a somewhat ambitious list, but I thought it was entirely doable. Now that we’ve come to the end of the challenge and my final report, I’m stiff, I’m sore, I’m proud of what we accomplished… but I’m also a little bummed that I couldn’t cross everything off.

In that respect, Sarah, whose update you saw earlier this week, is the winner.

Here’s my final list:

Hang the gate
~~Edge the garden~~
~~Build raised beds around the perimeter~~
Build trellises for the raspberries, tomatoes and squashes (I have wood and wire, but nothing’s put together yet)
~~Start a few seeds indoors~~
~~Till~~ in ~~the~~ ash, ~~straw~~ and ~~manure~~ (still only half the garden is done)

And a couple of maybes:

~~Weather permitting, plant grapes and potatoes~~
Run a waterline out to the garden (this one is Matt’s task, so I’m not really feeling too bad that we didn’t get this done)

So I made it just over halfway through my to-do list (56% if you’re wondering).

The perimeter beds were definitely a much bigger project than I anticipated–both in terms of the amount of work and their literal size. But I’m really happy with how they turned out. In fact, I’ve already started filling them up with onion (seeds), sunflower (seeds) and grapes.

Although filling might be a bit of an exaggeration. According to my original calculations when we started this challenge, the perimeter of the garden is approximately 175 feet. The beds are just over 2 feet deep, which means we have 350 square feet in the perimeter alone. I’m not sure Matt and I eat enough food to keep up with this garden!

The outer beds are obviously where I spent most of my time throughout this challenge, but the interior of the garden–or at least half of it–got some attention too. We’re now up to 5 rows of potatoes (who exactly is going to eat all these?). We have three rows of reds, which we grew for the first time last year, and then we have two new varieties that we’re trying out: Kennebecs (highly recommended by Karen at The Art of Doing Stuff) and Russian Blues (another Karen suggestion that I couldn’t resist adding just for fun).

Our sprouts have overcome their damping off and are growing well. In fact, I’ve moved on to the hardening off stage and they’ve spent a few days outside this week. Matt brought home some tomato plants to supplement our own seedlings. Those can probably go in the garden this weekend, but I’m going to let our sprouts grow a bit more before they move outside permanently.

Aside from finishing the raised beds, our biggest accomplishment last weekend was wrestling an abandoned hay bale out of the tree line beside our big field (where it and a friend have lived for years)…

onto the trailer (seriously, it took us about 45 minutes to get to this point)…

and up to the garden.

I’m going to try the deep mulch method to deal with weeds, maintain moisture and add nutrients to the garden. This bale is going to be my mulch. Hopefully it’s enough because I do not want to go back to get his friend. What a ridiculous way to spend a holiday Monday morning.

So obviously work does not end on the garden just because Dueling DIY has concluded. Trellising and tilling and gating and waterlining are still going to happen. As is planting and growing and (hopefully) harvesting. And I’ll be sharing more garden updates as we go along–I can’t help myself.

The beauty of taking on a project like this Dueling DIY is that in the end we each win. We’ve each made progress on our gardens, and we’re closer to enjoying the fruits of our labour (literally) than we were six weeks ago.

Thanks for the motivation, Sarah. And congratulations on your victory. I may have to send you a potato as a prize. And thanks to all of you for following along, doing your own challenges at your homes and encouraging us.

How’s your big spring project going? What gardening progress have you made recently?

Dueling DIY – The Challenger’s Final Update

Posted on May 25, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Six weeks ago, Sarah in Illinois and I started a Dueling DIY challenge. Our mission was to get our gardens in shape for the year through some friendly competition. Today, Sarah’s here with her final update on how she did. To see how we got here, check out all of our previous posts.

I have to admit, when I first made my list of things to finish for the challenge, I thought that I made it too easy on myself.

I saw Julia’s list and thought that I was sure to win.

However, what I learned was: most projects take longer than what I plan for, weather does not care what you have planned, and I procrastinate just as much as I did in high school when doing homework.

So as you can guess from what I have written so far, I did not completely finish everything on my list. But I sure made a valiant effort!

1. Make some kind of designated area (possibly raised bed) for annual vegetables such as asparagus and strawberries.

I call this 90% done. Everything is planted. Asparagus and strawberries are planted, rhubarb is in the ground and seeds and bulbs are planted for my cutting garden.

For the borders I used old rough cut barn wood. We have a large pile of old wood out in the barn but I did not find enough long boards. So I am going to have to keep digging to find a couple more boards.

However, I am happy to have the two outside beds defined so that there is no fear of cutting too close with the mower.

2. Neaten and define north flower bed and add mulch.

Nothing new has been done here. Steve and I are debating on whether to buy a couple bags of mulch or dive right in and get a truck load.

Now that he is in the field all hours of the day, we still haven’t made the decision so the mulch didn’t get put on the flower bed. But I am still happy with how this flower bed is filling out.

3. Divide mums and spread around deck.

This is the first thing that I finished, and the mums are really taking off.

4. Make a designated gardening area complete with workbench.

This was my favorite project!

We were tearing out a room in our pole barn and so I had the countertop and the top shelf ready. All I had to do was make the framework.

I say that was “all I had to do” but designing the work bench from scratch was time-consuming. I knew I wanted a top shelf and a shelf underneath. I also knew I wanted a place to hang my tools.

I used mostly older barn wood but a few pieces are newer pine so I used the darkest stain that I had on hand to try to blend the different woods together. I really could not be happier with the finished project!

So here is my final list:

~~Make some kind of designated area (possibly raised bed) for annual vegetables such as asparagus and strawberries.~~
~~Neaten, and define north flower bed and add mulch.~~
~~Divide mums and spread around deck.~~
~~Make a designated gardening area complete with workbench.~~

I won’t find out until Julia’s post to see how I fared in this competition, but I’m feeling kind of good about my odds!

I am so happy that we did this challenge. I guarantee if I didn’t have the constant competition in the back of my mind, I would not have gotten as much done as I did.

I would have made excuses about how I was tired, or how I had so many other things to do, and I would have avoided all of the hard work. But I am proud at how much I got done, and I am happy with my progress whether I “win” or not!

(It would be nice to win though!)

Okay. I’m impressed that Sarah can cross everything off her list. And that potting bench is awesome. I’ll be back on Friday with my final post in this Dueling DIY challenge.

Dueling DIY Week 5

Posted on May 18, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Five weeks ago Sarah in Illinois and I started a friendly Dueling DIY competition to help us get our gardens in shape. In last week’s update, Sarah was distracted by newborn kittens and falling behind. I gave a fist pump and started to calculate how much farther ahead I could get. But apparently I was counting my kittens before they hatched as the saying goes. With just one week left, I’ve had a setback. Read on to find out what happened and if you want to review the progress we’ve made up to now, you can check out all of the previous posts here.

Let’s start with the bad news first.

#1: In this Dueling DIY challenge, this is all of the cuteness I can offer. Cute absolutely, but perhaps not at the level of Sarah’s kitten cuteness.

Bad news #2: Some of our sprouts aren’t doing so hot. I think it might be a case of damping off. Although some things might be turning around. (More on this below).

And the worst news: We lost a full weekend of work because both Matt and I are sick. I ventured outside at one point and spent 45 minutes lying on the lawn when I felt like I couldn’t stand up anymore. Matt is on antibiotics for throat and ear infections. I’m holding on to my belief that this is just a cold. The amount of time we spent horizontal meant that we didn’t spend time working in the garden. So, so, so incredibly frustrating.

But between the time of my last update and being struck down with this plague, we had accomplished a few things. So there is some good news in this Dueling DIY challenge.

We have a new team member: Colonel Briggs. Short for Briggs and Stratton, our new rototiller. Honestly, Matt’s been wanting an upgrade since we inherited Fairfield. When he brought the Colonel home, he declared that the rototiller couldn’t have just a single name, hence the title.

Matt put the Colonel to work right away, and they’ve tilled half the garden.

(A face shield is not normally necessary for tilling. Matt wanted ear protection, and his chainsaw helmet was closest).

We’re thisclose on the raised beds. I have about four timbers left to set–less than 1/8 of the perimeter to go. Then I have to spread the cardboard, layer in the mulch and top them up with dirt.

We had four yards of triple mix delivered, and I’ve filled the raised beds more than half of the way around the garden. I feel I have to say the beds would be completely done if we hadn’t been sick. Argh.

Despite not being finished with the garden set-up, we’ve already moved on to planting. Three (!) rows of potatoes are in, and we’re not done yet. A new shipment of seed potatoes arrived in the mail yesterday.

I’ve also planted eight grape vines. I’m so excited about these grapes. Although I fully admit that I have no idea what I’m doing with them. I’m trying to read about pruning and planting and trellising and training. Right now, I’m focusing on watering them and keeping my fingers crossed that they take root. Please share any tips you have.

In terms of smaller updates, let’s start with the literally small–the sprouts. As you saw at the top, we’ve had a lot of shriveling and dying. We’re down to just one watermelon out of seven. We lost about half the tomatoes too. I think it was a case of damping off, so I’m giving the watering can a rest.

The sprouts continued to die, but I was very surprised that some new sprouts started popping up as things dried out. We have a new watermelon–our first of the Crimson Sweet variety–and a whole bunch of new tomatoes. I know I’m going to have to separate the sprouts that are doubled (or tripled) up. I’m not sure I can bring myself to pinch out the extra sprouts, but I’m not sure I can keep everyone alive if I try to separate and transplant them. Any advice?

The other win is that the raspberries–black and red–are weeded. And the raspberries themselves are spreading like weeds. I’m so pleased with how they’ve settled in.

And if we hadn’t spent our whole weekend horizontal, we would have the trellises set up to support them.

Argh.

Let’s move on, shall we? We’ll take a look at the original to-do list. Again, I can cross a little bit more off.

Hang the gate
~~Edge the garden~~
~~Build~~ raised ~~beds~~ around ~~the~~ perimeter (more than half done)
Build trellises for the raspberries, tomatoes and squashes
~~Start a few seeds indoors~~
~~Till~~ in ~~the~~ ash, ~~straw~~ and ~~manure~~ (half done)

Only one week to go in this Dueling DIY challenge. Send vitamins.

Garden Dueling DIY Week 4

Posted on May 11, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Sarah in Illinois and I are in week 4 of our Dueling DIY challenge.We’ve been making slow progress on our gardens (you can check out the progress in our previous posts), but recently Sarah’s attention has been directed elsewhere.

Distractions. It sounds a lot better than: “I am really far behind and worried that Julia may very well win the competition.”

What has me distracted?

Bad weather:

A full day of shopping at an antique/craft market and then shopping at a HUGE garden center with my mom and my brother’s girlfriend:

My purchases: rhubarb, cucumbers, spaghetti squash, rosemary, parsley, fun flowers and a micro cherry tomato plant. (I can’t wait to see what it produces!)

And then finally a surprise litter of kittens:

I mean, seriously, who can get any work done when you have this to cuddle?

I knew that one of my cats was very likely pregnant and when one day she was noticeably thinner, I started searching. She hid them very well and it took me four days to find them. But now that I have, I can’t stay away. I will be sure to find homes for all of them as soon as they are old enough but until then, I get to love on them!

Thankfully I did take advantage of some beautiful weather the last few days of April, and I made great improvement to the landscaping on the north end of the house. I hand washed the siding to remove all of the green that has been building up.

Before:

After:

My mom gave me two of the roses I had planted when I still lived at home and I transplanted to this bed.

However, until I get some mulch, I can’t mark this off my list. So I hate to admit it, Julia, but I cannot mark a single thing off this week.

Make some kind of designated area (possibly raised bed) for annual vegetables such as asparagus and strawberries — Area is tilled and asparagus planted but strawberries need planted and needs border
Neaten, and define north flower bed and add mulch — So close!
~~Divide mums and spread around deck~~
Make a designated gardening area complete with workbench

I am very aware of how few days are left in this challenge. So I am going to dig down and find the drive to make these last two weeks count (between kitten snuggles)!

Okay. Sarah definitely wins in the cuteness category. And some of the shopping and roses are in the gardening category, even if they’re not on the to-do list. I’m ahead for now. Hopefully it stays that way for the next two weeks.

Garden Dueling DIY Week 3

Posted on May 4, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Sarah in Illinois and I have entered into a friendly competition this spring to help us get our gardens in shape. We’re now at the conclusion of week 3 of this Dueling DIY, and I’m sharing my second update. You can check out all of the previous posts here.

It was just noon on Sunday. I had a long list of things that I wanted to do in the garden, but I was running out of steam. I managed a few more hours before I ~~hobbled~~ retreated indoors. (Sarah, take note that I said the garden claimed a temporary victory. I am not conceding anything yet in this DIY duel).

I still don’t have any dramatic before and after pictures to share yet. But I can report some progress.

The big accomplishment so far is edging the garden.

Our garden is 2,462 square feet, which means, if I’m remembering my geometry formulas correctly, its outer perimeter is roughly 175 feet. Whatever the distance, it felt like it took a very long time to go around the whole outer edge.

Here’s what the edge looked like at the start. Ugh.

Edging a weedy garden

Here’s the progress shot.

Edging the vegetable garden

And here’s the final.

Wood "curbs" to edge a vegetable garden

We used the fence posts (or in the case of the image above, the telephone pole) as “curbs.” I’m hoping they accomplish two things: 1) Keeping weeds out of the garden. 2) Keeping small critters from crawling under the chainlink and into the garden.

Matt cut the fence posts to length with his chainsaw and then we dropped them into the shallow trenches that I’d dug around the perimeter.

Remember this picture from my last update of all of the materials for the garden?

Materials for the garden update

We’re now down to a single pile of posts (and some firewood).

Fence posts

I also made a dent in the lumber part of the pile when I went on a marathon stake making session.

An electric mitre saw is perhaps not a conventional garden tool, but I wanted a lot of stakes.

Cutting garden stakes with a mitre saw

How many stakes? I couldn’t find the energy to count. More than 10 gallons worth.

Pails of garden stakes

The stakes came into play with my plan for the other half of the fence posts: the raised beds.

My plan is to build shallow raised beds just around the outside edge of the garden. These will host asparagus, grapes, rhubarb, sunflowers, and probably beets, lettuce and who knows what else.

Again, I’m using the fence posts as curbs, and I’m holding them in place with the stakes.

Shallow rustic raised vegetable garden beds

After digging my way around the outside of the garden, I have no desire to do more weeding, so I’m giving the lasagna method a try within the raised beds.

I used cardboard for my base layer. (Die weeds, die).

Using cardboard to kill weeds in the vegetable garden

Then I covered that with a layer of straw mulch that has been composting in the garden since last fall. I was surprised how much the straw has broken down already. I think it should be good food for the new beds.

Straw mulch

Four yards of topsoil arrived yesterday morning, so I will top up the beds this weekend.

The raised beds were where I lost my mojo. I had a small sledge for hammering in the stakes, but swinging the hammer over and over (and over and over) was surprisingly tiring. So I’ve made it halfway around the garden.

I know it’s halfway because I’ve marked the centre aisle with our super long rope. The picture below doesn’t look like a lot of progress, but you might be able to see the curbs at the far right waiting to be set in place.

Unfortunately, you’re also able to see all the weeds. Matt got the rototiller running with no trouble, which got us very excited, but as soon as he started to till it stalled. And stalled. And stalled. So frustrating. So the straw and weeds and ash are all still sitting on the soil.

Gardening progress

One place the weeds are gone is in the red raspberry row. Woo-hoo for small victories. (The twine is to mark the row until I get a proper trellis in place).

Raspberry row marked with stakes and twine

A bigger victory is how much the raspberries have expanded. Look at all those little plants. This is going to be good. And the black raspberries next door–while still weedy–also appear quite healthy.

Raspberry sprouts

My usual gardening sidekick is Bax. It was nice to be a trio this weekend thanks to Matt’s help with the fence posts. However, as soon as Matt was done cutting, Bax was more than ready for bro time–indoors. Apparently he’s only interested in gardening if he can work on his tan at the same time. The weather was cloudy and drizzly, and as much as dude likes to pretend he’s an outdoor dog, he’s a fairweather outdoor dog.

Thankfully, Ralph is much tougher than her brother, so she braved the weather to keep me company. And unlike the sunbather, she actually participated, inspecting the raised beds and even assisting with some weeding.

Ralph in the garden

Eventually, though, even I gave in and retreated to the indoors. (Ralph as always stayed outside).

However, there’s still some more progress inside. Tomatoes (Sicilian Saucers) and peppers (a random mix) have sprouted, and I transplanted our tallest watermelon sprouts already.

Watermelon sprouts

We cut our seed potatoes down to isolate individual sprouts, and they’re firmly at the grody stage. We really need to get them in the ground this weekend.

Chitted potato sprouts

The weather forecast is supposed to be bright and warm this weekend, so I have high hopes again for progress and productivity. However, I’m away from the farm a bit (have to remember Mother’s Day) and… guess what… picking up my grapes. I’m excited to have my first vines. Finger crossed I can keep them alive and help them grow the way they’re supposed to.

Before I get to that, though, let’s go back to my original to-do list. I can cross at least a couple more things off.

Hang the gate
~~Edge the garden~~
~~Build~~ raised ~~beds~~ around ~~the~~ perimeter (half done)
Build trellises for the raspberries, tomatoes and squashes
~~Start a few seeds indoors~~
Till in the ash, straw and manure

Three weeks to go, Sarah. We’re halfway through this Dueling DIY. Are you going to make it? The garden may have kicked my butt last weekend, but I’m going to be back and better than ever in just a few days. Watch out.

What progress have you made on your spring projects at your house? Any tips for lasagna gardening? Or building raised beds? How about growing grapes? Or keeping a rototiller running? Do you have any furry gardeners at your house?