Gardening – The Build

I have wanted to start gardening for quite some time.  I’ll bounce the idea around in my head but I’ve never actually taken the plunge to just do it and get started.  I experimented with growing my own herbs in pots, which was enjoyable, but I’ve really wanted to grow garlic and tomatoes and other delicious goodies to supplement what I can get at the farmers market. 

Needless to say, I’ve had quite a lot of time to research and figure out which methods I believe will suit me best.  Then, a friend of mine linked to an awesome looking composter and that was the thing that finally pushed me over the precipice.  I couldn’t justify getting an awesome composter if I didn’t garden, you see! 

This week, during one of the many rain storms, I dragooned Art into going to Lowes with me to pick up some wood, screws, brackets, and weed paper.  Aside from getting drenched, this was a fairly easy process.  Actually, the entire construction was fairly easy and took us less than an hour total. 

We started by spreading out three 16-foot lengths of 4-foot weed paper.  This will go under the raised bed to keep weeds from invading my veggies.  The two long sides of the bed are made from 2x12s that are 12 feet long. 

We screwed each corned together with three 3-inch screws and then secured them even more with two L brackets held in by 1 ¹⁄₄-inch screws. 

Working together, we made short work of all four corners. 

Although we did get eaten by bugs. 

The final bed is 4-foot by 12-foot.  We’re going to mulch around it at some point and then fill it with soil enriched with our own compost.  I was worried it would be too small when I was planning it, but now that we’ve built the thing it seems HUGE. 

My first planting project will be to plant garlic in the fall and we’ll see where it goes from there!