Hit the Road, Jack! ~ With the last frost day came much gardening!

According to the Famer's Almanac website, this past week was our area's last frost date. Since that old Jack Frost hit the road, I decided to do some major gardening this past week! I estimate that I spent 20-25 hours outside forming beds, sifting dirt and planting seeds and seedlings. It didn't hurt that our area also had an unseasonably warm week with sunny days in the upper-60s/low-70s!! It was pure gardener bliss. Let me show you what I accomplished!

I had to post this "before" picture so you could see what a grubby mess the area was just a few weeks ago. We tilled up an area that had previously been partially grassed, partially taken over by blackberry vines for years, used for a driveway the last couple years, and obviously used for a dump by previous owners in years past...

It is now a tilled, sifted, shaped thing of gardening beauty! Well, it is getting there, anyway...

Let's take a walk through my garden.
This is the first year I've tried to grow corn. I wouldn't have thought you could do it successfully here in the Pacific Northwest, but we have a friend who has done great for several years now with his corn ~ we get to enjoy it every 4th of July. I want to enjoy my own all summer long, though. Hopefully this year I can. I bought a variety that was made to grow in planter pots, believe it or not. I chose it so I could move it around and place it in the sun to get the most hours of sun each day. However after seeing how much sun my garden gets all day long this past week, I decided to just try it out in the ground and see how it does! Grow, little corn, grow!

Because of my  utter failure with growing broccoli and cabbage from seedlings (check that out in this blog from 2 weeks ago), I bought some starter plants this week and stuck them in the ground. It sure is an easy quick way to feel like a successful gardener, isn't it?! haha.

The whole bottom half of the garden is filled with my vining plants. Here are five mounds of zucchini. I also have 5 mounds of cantaloupe, 5 mounds of pickling cucumbers, and 5 mounds of salad cucumbers. The bottom of the hill will be the pumpkin patch!

This is a much better picture of my onions and garlic ~ check out how much they've grown since only 2 weeks ago! The foremost section of the photo are walla walla sweet onions I bought as starters from the feed store. the second row back are onions I planted as small bulbs, then the garlic are behind them. (Do you like my rock paths that separate my beds?! I do! Because I dug each and every one of those rocks out by hand!)

I also bought several sweet and hot peppers this week and planted them in pots. Well, most of them are in pots. I got curious about what would do better - pots or ground, so there are a couple in the ground as well in the way of experimentation!

MY FIRST POTATO PLANT!!!! When my husband pointed that out to me yesterday I literally shouted with joy! I read so much about the different ways people do potato towers and I tried a little bit of each suggestion, so at least one of the versions is working! haha

These are the shelling peas I planted, and I've never done those before ~ they don't grow as fast as sweet peas, or at least this variety doesn't, so I'm glad to see them reaching up. (Look at all those darn pebbles that are still in the dirt! Ack!)

Yay for easy-to-grow sweet peas! I think every Northwest gardener should grow sweet peas for that quick and satisfying success early in the season! ;-)

I've never tried tee-pees to support my peas before, and I think the "flaw" in this plan is that there is nothing for the peas to grab onto until they are several inches tall and ready to fall over. So I added some string around the tee-pees and that seems much better since most of the peas are tall enough to need something to support them already, but can't quite reach the nearest pole.

This is the sad state of my rhubarb that I posted about on Facebook earlier this week. I had these big boys in pots and I don't think I was watering them enough in our little dry spell last week, and they suffered a bit. Not to mention, the one on the left is the one my neighbor just pulled out of her garden last month and blessed me with. Now they both have a permanent home next to the compost bin where I think they'll perk up and be quite happy.

I want to continue to show you the celery I grew in water from the leftover stub I bought from the store. Yes, they do grow quickly in water, but eventually the outer stalks wilt away and they need something more for nutrients. They seemed to have stagnated in the ground; however, I checked and they are sprouting roots, so I still have hope.

One of many tomato plants I potted this week... There is just nothing like a garden fresh tomato.

 

I also wanted to update you on the sweet potato slips I'm trying to grow from store-bought organic sweet potatoes inside.  Here is a picture from 2 weeks ago and today:

 

 

 

 

That first little sprout you see in the top photo is the tallest leaf  you can see in the bottom photo! Only 2 weeks! Amazing! When they are about 6-inches tall, I'll pop them off the potatoes and move them to a glass of water until they sprout roots. Then they'll be ready to put in he ground (where will I put them!? I'm running out of room!!!)

 

Thanks for taking a walk in my garden with me. I love talking about the new life that is growing all around me! Now that Jack Frost is gone for a while, I expect to see a whole lot more of it, too! According to all those little seed packets, I'll have lots of fun seedling photos to post in, "7-14 days!" ;-) I'll be sure to show you when everything sprouts!