Yay for the garden! Every day it's such a wonderful surprise to go out and see what changes have occurred overnight. Even though it been baking hot and dry, the plants are all taking off and even our late planted beans are producing. I'm excited to show you just a few pictures of the progress, especially these where the flowers, herbs and veggies are all growing right over the grass...
In the foreground are Zinnias, the taller stalks in the middle are sunflowers, the thin waspy plants are love-in-a-mist and back against the wall are squash and bean plants. All of the seeds in front were thrown down into the grass and a very thin layer of dirt was sprinkled over them. In the back I had placed a bunch of leaf mulch on the ground which was still there and quite deep, so I just planted the seeds directly into the mulch, just tucked under some of the leaves.
This is a round summer squash, it's starting to get some flowers and is really quite happy. You can see a bit of the leaf mulch in the top right section of the picture. In the bottom left corner are a few bush bean leaves. The grass has been great as a ground cover, keeping the water around for the squash to use. The combination of lawn and leaf mulch has proved to be quite beneficial.
Lovely Cilantro, growing up around the rocks of a keyhole. You can see one of the vining winter squash moving towards the center with the large mama Rose in the background, growing against the garage. This ia a thicketing rose and you can see some of it's shoots right next to the cilantro in front. All of these wonderful food plants growing in and around the grass, so easy! Plus the cilantro and rose are great companion plants and encourage better health in each other.
So this will be the last picture for now, and though it seems rather bland, I find it exciting. This tiny alpine strawberry was a transplant. I saved this little guy from a certain death of lawn mower blades and placed it in a very sad, down hill, barren space in the yard. It only had two triple leaf sets when I planted it and look now! It's really quite happy, growing tons of new leaves and even some runners as well. I'm really looking forward to having a nice mat of alpine strawberry instead of a bunch of dirt that just slides away.
As you can see the garden has been very busy lately. There are tons of bees buzzing around and this morning there was a whole troupe of sparrows outside the back door enjoying the fruits of the yard. I am so thankful to be able to go outside and enjoy the soil between my fingers. My son loves being outside now, he's just started helping mommy water, but I can't wait until we don't have to water anymore, when we can rely on the natural cycles. That won't happen in this house, but I know there is one just waiting to be turned into a living classroom, and we are more than happy to do all the work.
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