Catching Up

Since I decided to do this after we had already built the garden and gotten stuff ready I'm just going to write a summary of what's been done in our first year of a garden.

We (meaning mostly I, and some input from the family) decided to plant 5 types of tomatoes, 4 types of peppers, two types of basil, chives, peas, green beans, potatoes, lettuce, cucumbers, and strawberries. Me and my dad built the raised bed frame, which is about 30' x 3.5'. My friend and I used her truck to take a trip down to the solid waste agency and have it filled with (free!) compost three times. It took all day and was hard work, but it was a blast. We then went to Earl May and got straw for mulch, marigolds to do their magic thing that tomatoes apparently like, and strawberry plants. Unfortunately we only get six strawberry plants and our planter takes nine, so our six are just waiting to be planted. We then made some rows in the mulch to plant lettuce, for which I am VERY excited because I've never had anything but supermarket iceberg, with the occasional romaine thrown in. I chose Yugoslavian Red Butterhead and Forellenschuss as our lettuces because they both had some nice seed catalog prose. Also, a few weekends before my friend and I planted the basil, dill, moss rose flowers, and some tomatoes in a seed starting setup.

Most of the lettuce seeds have now sprouted and I'm am impatiently waiting for them to grow some leaves so I can thin them out while sampling my choices. I also planted the potatoes, but having so many different types of plants in a relatively small garden means that I only have a total of about 7 feet of potatoes, plus our two Potato Grow Bags from Gardener's Supply Co. That probably won't end up being very much potatoes but we also have our CSA, for which I am also VERY excited because we will have so many fresh local vegetables and I will be able to feel all good and happy about inside while I stuff my face.

As I write this I should really probably be working on my research paper that I haven't really started yet, or doing my calculus, but oh well.

Just in case any of you wanted to know what types of each plant I'm growing, I'll give you a list of all the fancy-sounding heirlooms because the other plants just have lame generic names anyway. If I end up having fantastic harvests of peas or something, you can just ask me where I got them later on down the road.
Tomatoes: Yellow Sausage, Isis Candy (sounds sooo good), Cherokee Purple, Brandywine, Gold Medal
Peppers: Fish, Tolli's Sweet Italian, Buran, and something else (we ordered plants from Seed Saver's so long ago)
Basil: Thai and Purple

Alright that paper is really calling... peace.