YOU GROW GIRL!

Life has been busy. Today, I`m taking it easy. (As easy as one can with a house full of chores patiently waiting on me, with tapping feet and rolling eyes. Yes, laundry, one moment pleeeease.)

Today, I picked up my ``You Grow Girl`` book, and I`m so excited for my seeds to come in, and get my garden started. Some things will need to be started at the end of March, to be ready to go outside at the end of May, and for me it`s time to start thinking and plotting it out now.

This also had me thinking about my targets. Because I was thinking that this might be the last year I have a garden here - if all continues as it is now, next year at about this time we`ll be picking out a new house. I`m so in love with my garden here, I`m seriously going to have to hire some people to pack it up and take it with me. There will be bins and bins of strawberries, grasses, bushes, lilies....I feel a TIE with them, even if the new place already has beautiful gardens. I`ll still want my boxes and containers to grow veggies and greens!

Anyway... A new plan of attack this year on the garden.

• The tomatoes (which are indeterminate, so grow taller than me by the end of the year ) will be surrounded with the zucchini, instead of all crammed into one box. (the boxes are all 3 x 7). They will probably take at least 2 of the boxes.
  
• The small sugar pumpkins are moving to a different box, where they have room to roam and not get into the kids play area... last year they reached out to play, too!
• The little finger carrots will stay where they were. I wonder if they could share space with the little eggplant. And, can I make eggplant so my family will eat it.
  
• The bit at the back fence is going to get covered over with newspaper mulch, so that the beans that are coming will have somewhere to climb (every year I attempt flowers back there, and every year it becomes over grown with wildness.) I`ve never done beans before (my beloved isn`t crazy about them, so I`ve put it off. Besides, my Father- in-Luv plants enough to feed small armies usually. hehe. Any ``extra`` I`ll take to market this summer.) BUT, can anyone tell me if squirrels will eat beans
  
• I`d like to box in the side garden, make the rows run the other direction this year, and put the melons in there... it`s a 10 x 10ish space, and I`m hoping I`ll be able to find the wood without having to purchase it.
• The little strawberries are going to need some straw this year along the lines.
  
• I`ve got an heirloom lettuce mixed pack coming - they are going to live in one of the boxes in the back, and I`m going to have to fortify that box with chicken wire or SOMETHING to keep nibbly critters out. I`ll probably put some in containers, too, though
• Swiss Chard. Possibly in Containers, along with Spinach, radish mix, hot pepper, sweet italian pepper, Unless I build ANOTHER box back there.
• Basil, chives, mint in pots.
• FLOWERS! They will live exclusively in the front yard this year. Under the Maple tree, in the front box. Morning glory (well, YEAH!) Some new Hollyhocks, (8 ft in sun!) Goats Rue (for the back of the garden box, which is always neglected.) Foamflower (for under the maple tree, because they like the shade a lot!)
  

I am going to need a LOT of soil. (I wonder what it will cost to have someone deliver it, rather than me going to the dump to get it myself... which kills my back and takes FOREVER.)
And a LOT of containers.
And mulch. Probably have to hit up a local farm for some hay.

Possibly a new shovel.

These thoughts make me happy today. The feel of gardening gloves with their little rubbery grippy bits. The smell of dirt. Talking to little baby seedlings (``You grow up big, little plant!``) The sun on my back and a very big hat on my head.

Sigh.

Well, that was fun. I`m going to do some dishes now, and daydream out the back window, pretend that it`s not snow covered but bright and green and growing.

Have a fantastic day!