The Garden Is Planted! Que The Singing Angels!

I planted my garden!

I planted my garden!

I planted my garden!

I am so excited! I did not plan a traditional family day, like I should have, so we just had the Easter egg hunt with some friends that we consider family and then we came home to eat our ham and potatoes and green beans with bacon and pepper in them! The green beans remind me of the way we make our garden green beans, so it really geared me up to go out and plant the garden!

I had already broken up the ground on Saturday. We do not have the pleasure of using a tiller, so I broke up the ground with a 4-tine twistable tilling device! UGH! There is nothing less fun that twisting your arms over and over and over again! On the upside, I think my bustline just magically got perkier! HA! Anyway, I took the tilling device out to the garden yesterday, in hopes of breaking up my of the yard, so as to increase the size of the garden, because I share "the fruits of my labor" with my neighbor, so he said I could break up some of his yard! He just doesn't want to mow! I got lucky and my husband broke up the sod! I did some of that yesterday and it was AWFUL! Needless to say, I have woke up these last two mornings feeling I have been hit by a truck! After all this yapping, all I really wanted to say is that my garden is now about 1 1/2 - 2 feet longer than it was last year. It is probably 8 x 12, or something like that.

I strategically placed my rows so as to maximize the amount of goodies I could plant! I put a row of yellow onions in and then green beans, because onions do not require much top space. Then, I put in a row of radishes, I think, and more green beans, followed by a row of carrots and, you guessed it, more green beans! I put in a row of red onions, packed tightly in place, because if all works according to plan, I will pull about half for green onions and then I will let the rest grow into bulb onions! Peppers, and more red onions, followed by a row of peas, finished out the items that I planted in seed form! Well, onions are not from seeds, but I am sure you already know that! Anyway, I have more room and more to plant, but there a 2-3 foot area that is just waiting for tomato plants and some banana peppers and maybe even some really mean, spicy peppers for my neighbor! The end of my garden has 12 mounds of potatos! I made a little area for an "herb garden" that has cilantro, parsley, sweet basil and something else, but for the life of me, I can not remember it! And, finally, I put cucumber seeds in a little patch at the other end of the garden. We will see if I get anything out of that mess! Last year, I was not very diligent with keeping the cucumber watered, so I got 3 the entire season! HA! Crazy, right!?

So, here is the fun part! I let B, Bucko, Ponch, Boog and Z all "help" me! It was GREAT! Nice try! There really is nothing great about having to force your kids to help, but I sure did follow through with it! Even when it meant hunting them down after they had wandered off into the house! I found two of them sitting at the computer! UGH! Steam was just a-rollin! I did not have much for them to do, but they were helping anyway! Everyone eats out of that garden and everyone was going to help, even if it killed ME! Almost! The one thing I should mention is that the little boys really do like to help plant seeds. As far as that goes, Z liked helping make rows with the hoe, but his rows were more crooked than mine and about 6 inches deep! I had him make potato hills instead. I gave him a certain amount of room, in which he could plant, and he used about half of that! I tried to get him to spread things out, but... I guess we will have close knit potatos this year!

Anyway, all in all, and a whole lot of typing later, I am so excited about having my garden planted! I would have taken a picture, but I assure you, there is nothing to see----yet!