Saturday Garden Work

Saturday found us back out in the garden, and once again Jonathan and the Blessings acomplished a great deal (pictures below). We have also revised our garden plans for this year a bit.

Midway through Friday's garden labors, Jonathan remarked that he was realizing that a gardening method like we are implementing this year is really best if it's built a bit at a time. I smiled and agreed. Then we went back into planning mode.

Our garden plot is 50' x 40', or about 2000 square feet. In our original plan, we actually underestimated the size at 50' x 30' (1500 sq ft). We had planned 14' long beds with a 2' walking path down the middle, as well as 18" paths between the beds. Like so:


We haven't finished our revisions to the garden plan, but we have pretty much decided that we're not going to lay out all the beds in the second half of the garden this year. We extended the beds on the house side of the garden to about 18 1/2', and plan to do at least two beds on the chicken coop side (for our corn). We still need to decide how we'll handle our winter squash (pie pumpkins, butternut, and spaghetti squash), potatoes, and melons, which will all also be on the coop side. So, stay tuned!

And now, pictures of Saturday's progress:
Kate, Ellie, and Barak on their way back for more mulch
Davey and Grace bringing over a wheelbarrow, while Jonathan lines up the next path
Josiah and Davey loading mulch
This poor pestered hen was again seeking shelter in the garden... this time, she jumped up behind me on my chair
The garden after Saturday's work
The mulch pile after Saturday's work
And a seedling update:
The two rows on the left are peppers, which hadn't sprouted yet. The four on the right are tomatoes.