The Reuser's Garden Part 2

Read Part 1

Once I finally had all the holes drilled, I basically put off doing anything else with the planters for a very long time. Honestly, I was dreading having to level out the ground and place each of the planters, so I just ignored the project for probably almost a year. Eventually, Dear BF could take my procrastination no longer and around July of last year, I finally decided to tackle the next step. Surprisingly, I had leveled the ground (albeit probably not very professionally) and placed the first planter in about half an hour. Spurred on by my success, I placed the second one before retiring for the afternoon.

The planters are seen here being leveled and placed.

The back three are already placed.

This photo shows what I did with the bottom half of the planters; used block foam (styrofoam) as a spacer, to take up room and make the planters lighter.

Next, I knew I'd need to bring in the big guns. Earlier in the year, I had met the sweetest high school senior, Stephen and knew that he was looking for extra work. I emailed him and he agreed to help me place and fill the planters. He even had a trailer that his family used for landscaping, so that was perfect for picking up the three-way soil mixture that the local landscaping supplier recommended. In two days, we had finished what I had put off for the better part of 2 years.

You can see the soaker hose in this photo and some of the plants that I actually kept alive for awhile.

That was in late August and quite frankly, I knew if I planted anything but didn't have a watering system set up, it would all die. Eventually, I want to put in a drip irrigation system, but for now, I have a soaker hose that I picked up at Goodwill (Canadian-made and brand new, still in packaging for ~$4) I did plant some items late last fall, but lost most of it to the cool weather. I was able to harvest some basil. (I think herbs are really my thing-I have a very successful herb garden in front of the house.) The only other thing that lived long enough for me to salvage last weekend was some parsley. (I brought it inside in a pot-we'll see if it lasts.) I turned over all the soil (and all the weeds) last weekend and laid down a few layers of newspaper to get it ready for spring. I'm excited to try again this season. Let's hope I can get better at planting things early enough that we'll actually get some home-grown grub this season.

"Mom, we wanna help!"

Our female, Zoe-Bear is a great helper. If by "great helper" you mean "gets in the way, but is cute, so we let her do what she wants."

See? Adorable.

The only other piece of the project that I'd like to do is to lay down newspaper or cardboard around all the planters and then lay chipped trees from an arborist on top of that, to control weeds growing around the planters.