Hi, I'm in NC too! Red clay can be a big issue here in NC; its very fertile once you can get a plant into it!! Be ready to add organic material (compost, "nature's helper" ground bark fines, etc). Choose your garden site carefully, you'll need 6-8 hours of sun AFTER the leaves have all come out on the trees. You don't want your plot too far from the house or from a water source. If you know where you want your garden located already, I'd suggest sending hubby out now with a bunch of cardboard to cover over the area. (Weight down the cardboard with bricks, boards, or mulch.) That will start killing back the sod in your garden plot and will make life much easier. Depending on your location, you will also need to consider fencing to keep out rabbits or (heaven help you) deer. Usually rabbits only terrorize pea plants for me, but with last year's drought they ate everything off and I had to put a 2.5' fence around the garden to save anything. I agree with the earlier posters about starting small but have one suggestion. If you know, for example, that you eventually want a 25' x 75' garden but don't feel like you can swing that this year with the pregnancy I'd recommend using the "future garden" site as a place to stack your cardboard, newspapers, leaves, grass clippings, etc this year. It will kill off the grass in the garden addition area for next year and keep all of your garden amendments close at hand this year. I don't recommend the garden cloth/weed barriers for your garden paths UNLESS you are lucky and somehow managed to get the only yard in NC without couch grass/bermuda grass. I'd suggest either setting up your garden with paths that are at least 3' wide this year, to allow you to use a stool or rolling garden bench when tending your plants. Mulching the paths with pine needles or ground up wood will keep it relatively weed free (I use several layers of newspaper under the mulch when first setting this up) and conserve water as well. Most city landfills have days or times of the day when you can pull in with a truck and a tarp and they'll load free mulch into your truck for little or no cost. They will require that you tie a tarp over it before leaving. Check with your local landfill site. As to what types of vegetables you plant, that's all in what you like to eat. Some things are more work to get going (example: asparagus, artichokes) but you should plant what you are interested in having fresh. I personally don't plant potatoes or carrots because clay soil makes both of these more work and less chance of a great outcome AND they're cheap and plentiful at the store. Tomatoes, lettuce, cukes, beans, and squash are another story. What you grow tastes much better than the store and its relatively easy to have a nice haul. I don't grow corn because we typically get several high wind storms every summer and that cancels out the crop. I love growing flowers and herbs alongside of my veggies for the beauty and benefit. Nothing like weeding with a crowd of butterflies and hummingbirds! Let me know if you are near the mountains of NC, I'd be happy to meet you and give you starts of herbs for your yard. Grow well and prosper neighbor!

Stacey - lots of 'crop rotation' discussions here of late that a search will pull up for you to read through if you wish. Some of them address your very questions. I linked a few of them for you. Dave Here is a link that might be useful: Crop rotation discussions

It's interesting to go through the entire thread and see that you did, in fact, take suggestions offered here. That's nice to see since I suppose many wonder if their advice if falling on deaf ears. I am so glad you dumped the idea of the dwarf alberta spruce. Good decision. Also, I see you nixed the landscaper's suggestion of the cotoneaster. While I am a big fan of cotoneaster in the right location, they would not have suited the front of your house. Another good decision. I think the whole thing looks sweet, actually. I liked that you stayed low on the left side of the house and did some nice repetion of form and plantings. I would like to see a note of height on the right side, but you can maybe add that in next year somehow. I also like the color palette...the soft pinks of the spirea, blues of the hydrangea (or pink depending on your soil) and the white azalea, along with the "traditional" (I assume you mean pink) azalea will work nicely I think. However, although right now the "hot" colors of your impatience are okay since the shrubs are small, next year you will want a softer, cooler palette of annual color. Also, I totally concur with the windowbox idea. That would look very nice, in my opinion. Patty

I think you can grow just about anything then, it's just a matter of a few things. Water retention, (or if you can water often enough) full sun, and nitrogen. For the nitrogen, apply and spread out a high Nitrogen based slow released granular fertilizer before you plant, and you should be good for the year. Or whatever high N based fertilizer you can get your hands on, nothing water soluble though, it's too much work trying to feed. The only crop I can think of that wont do the greatest in a foot of sandy soil is potatoes. Other then that, pretty much everything can be managed, a lot of it comes down to Nitrogen and keeping things watered, with sandy soil you tend to get a lot of drainage, which is good, but also a pain in the butt for moisture retention. You said it was a swamp area, so I'm assuming somehow it's retaining moisture? You said lettuce and root veg didn't grow well, If you tell me a bit more about the process, It would tell me alot about your soil and what's going on. How tall of tops are we talking about for your beets and carrots? and when did you plant the lettuce, and was it transplanted? When you grew the root veg, did you supplement with fertilizer, if so what was the NPK on it, and was it water soluble type? Did you feed often? Also, did you apply this same fertilizing techniques to your lettuce? Just a tip for next time, when you add soil or amend it with something, don't till the sand and mix it with what your amending, unless of course you only have 6 inches of topsoil to begin with. It's better to have a foot of soil, then 2 feet of soil that's heavily mixed with sand. 1 foot of soil that doesn't contain sand can really make a difference.