I was lucky that our farmers market has local organic garlic growers and our state farm market had California grow garlic so that is where all my "starts" came from. I would like to grow way more than I do grow. This year I thought I'd planted a lot more, but now I look at it, I'm not sure.
I'm working on expanding my food growing space greatly in the next few years and including fruit. I actually need to get on those plans today for the contractor. My goal is to eat almost exclusively off of our urban land.

Well, I'm almost ready to order stuff from Pinetree. I decided that since I had already gotten to the next shipping cost, I might as well get all the seeds I was considering, since it would cost more in shipping to order them another time. So, I'm also getting multiple varieties of things, like 2 carrot and 3 lettuce varieties.

However, we may have to wait on the fruit trees until we get our slab poured for my shed, so a truck can drive back there. But, we need another bid - our first bid was utterly outrageous!

I am so surprised. My spinach and lettuce seedlings are up and very leggy. They sure came up fast. I now have them in the window seat area. I am not much of an indoor seed "grower". So I am not sure what to do next.

I did save part of my seed to plant outside.

If you don't have a cold frame for growing cool weather crops, get a 30" GrowLight from WalMart (abt $20), two large cup hooks and some clothesline cord. Screw the hooks into your ceiling or overhang and tie the cord to your grow light fixture. It can be hoisted up and down as your plants grow. (You can also use your curtain rod instead of the hooks).
Keep the light within 2 inches from the top of your plants and raise it up as they grow.
Bye, bye leggy seedlings!

~Annie

I previously posted pictures of my potager from early summer. Here are pics of my Potager in July 2008: flowers, herbs and veggies:

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There are also pictures of my homestead, chickens and other critters. It ain't real tidy, but it's home!

Here is a link that might be useful: Annie's Homestead and Potager pictures - July-Aug. 2008

I would love to grow food along with my flowers and herbs. I think they compliment each other very well. I love the look of teepee's sticking up with beans climbing and flowers surrounding them. The problem with my veggies though is I have a magor white tail deer problem and the annoyance of chipmunks and squirrels. Fencing is a must for me (only takes care of deer though) and my gardens have to be in the front yard. My useable backyard is just a 10-12' wide strip behind my house and than a stone wall with a naturalized hill behind it, plus my back yard is part shade all year. Some spots get at the most 3-4 hours sun tops. The front has 3 full size maples, 1 large evergreen and 1 large not known tree at the corner of my yard that my neighber has said I own. Full sun spots are few and far apart from each other, so fencing in a decent sized area is hard. I do have a strip along my driveway that gets full sun and is a rectangle shape, so it's easy to fence, that's where my tomatoes are going next year and my garlic raised bed is next to it.

I did look into having my trees taken down, I can't even afford 1. If I took down the tree's I would have quite a bit to work with in the front than.

Melissa

Annie, it felt good walking through your potager. The pic of the potager entrance is my favorite. And you have Barred Rocks, I want those someday. Now you have me dreaming of summer....

I am getting rid of the Wyandottes - mean damned things!
Going to get more Barred Rock hens (no roosters), and then get a flock of the big, sweet, gentle Buff Orpington hens and one Buff rooster. They are huge, heavy bodied chickens, but the sweetest things. I love heir pretty yellow feathers. So come April, I will be getting new stock!

Annie - an great addition to your gro-light - a timer. I have all of my grow lights on timers, and especially in the dark of winter, when you get up to a black sky, taking your coffee(or whatever) in to check out your seedlings before breakfast is priceless!!

Nancy.

Melissa, plant things inside the fence, so the deer can't see through. Deer won't jump over what they can't see over/through. Here I used Salvia indigo spires, and tied it to the fence when it started falling over.

Unless you have some one who will complain,(like an HOA) I used a cheap and easy fence.
I used those green T-posts and inexpensive fencing wire. I used electical ties to hook the wire/fencing to the T-posts.

Thanks for the reminder Nancy!

I've seen those timers at Lowe's. I will get one...er two! :)

I need more GrowLights. They are fantastic!

~ Annie

Just last year I began growing vegetables, and this year I planted some fruit trees (pears, persimmons, & a jujube).

I created four small raised beds for the veggies and have asparagus in one bed, blackberries in two of the other beds and sunchokes (Jerusalem Artichokes) in a third. The fact that my soil is so awful limits me.

So, tell me what you think of the following idea: I have two very long free-form garden beds (85 ft) that flank either side of a brick pathway. I have all ornamentals in these two beds and they are not raised. What if I made smaller 24" x 24" raised beds to grow veggies in inside of these free-form beds? Would that look awful? Honestly, it takes very tough plants to grow in what I have (3-4" of topsoil over caliche, which is like limestone cement).

Just today I stuck spinach bedding plants here and there. Because I get a lot of afternoon sun, I planted them on the east side of ornamentals and perennials.

I think that is referred to as Cottage gardening. LOL

Kathy

#1.
Check out the Potager forum/gallery for ideas.

#2.
Build your Raised Beds. They are the way to go, especially with Caliche soil. I used to live in the Mojave desert, so I know what that is! Ack! It was indeed like concrete! Great for dune buggies and motorcycles though!

Here in Oklahoma where I now live, I have very sandy, alkaline soil. It is almost as bad. My water is very hard - lots of minerals. My soil is great for growing things like herbs, salvias and grasses, but not very good for most other plants, especially veggies and acid loving plants.
So, in the fall and winter, I pile on leaves, (pine straw when available), wheat straw and other hay, manure hay (from the nearby county fairgrounds livestock pens and from the litter of my chickens and rabbit), or bagged manure from a garden center that is already composted; bags of peat will help lower your soil's pH.. Add kitchen waste, like used coffee grounds, spent tea bags, veggie & fruit scraps, egg shells (crumbled), cut up banana peels, orange peels, ("green material"),&etc (no meats, cheese, fish, or fats). I add shredded newspapers, all paper/cardboard trash torn into pieces, coffee filters torn into pieces ("brown material"), and keep adding it all winter long to build up my soil. Pile it high and deep. Once in awhile, I dig it in and turn it over, but some people don't do that and have good results. By spring, I have great soil in my raised beds and other areas too. Because my soil leaches out so badly, I have to do this continuously, but it reduces the amount of waste I would be putting in bags to the curb and going to landfills, so I am doing my part to replenish the earth!
When it is windy, I put all my paper stuff in a mop bucket and add water. Let it sit for a day or two and then dump the whole thing into my pile. It decays faster and adds much needed brown material to the mix.
This is called On-site composting - building your compost where you are going to be growing something.

Hope this helps.

Annie enjoyed your albums very much this morning! Thanks for sharing them. Love the chickens, even called DH in to see those beautiful Wyandottes. Glad you said you didn't like them. We had the meanest rooster last year...DH hit him one time too many................

I have Buffs, Barred Rock and Black Australorps. The Australorps are my favorites, but I do love the Buffs too. All of them very gentle.{{gwi:632859}}

I like that little black hen. She looks so cute.
I didn't know anything about Black Australorps, so thanks for the info. I might get some of those too. I like sweet, gentle chickens.
A Marsh hawk got my sweet Buffs, one by one. I was standing right by one of them when the hawk flew down and snatched it. Makes me so mad. They NEVER snatch up the mean ones!
I have three too many roosters right now. They are going to be put in a pot here real soon. Tired of feeding and caring for the evil bastards and then having them thank me by attacking me while I am standing there feeding them! Tired of carrying that big stick to protect myself. The big Barr Rock rooster attacked me last week and really did a lot of damage on my right leg. It is still badly bruised and sore. I had to beat him back with the empty metal coffee can I was carrying with their scratch. He just kept coming at me hitting my shin with both of his feet. I have bad circulation and varicose veins - well thanks for the new broken veins, Mr. Rooster! Just what I DIDN'T need. I finally drove him back about 30 feet and he ran off. Wish I could have "hit him too many times"! I would have chopped off his head! I just can't have that.
No more mean roosters!

I started a mew thread along this same line, cooking and other hobbies in Conversations, in case anyone wants to add anything..

trailrunner, started with a new long rise pizza dough.

I was afraid they might shut us down over here.

"Melissa, plant things inside the fence, so the deer can't see through. Deer won't jump over what they can't see over/through. Here I used Salvia indigo spires, and tied it to the fence when it started falling over.
Unless you have some one who will complain,(like an HOA) I used a cheap and easy fence.
I used those green T-posts and inexpensive fencing wire. I used electical ties to hook the wire/fencing to the T-posts."

Planymaven,
I don't think my area has a hoa, I do live in a nice area, but it's an older area, not 1 of those new developements with all the rules.
I actually have been using the blacking plastic heavy duty deer netting that's 4' high with no problem now for 3 years. Those have all been small sections though, no bigger than 9'x9'. So if I do a larger area, I might have a problem with them jumping. It's all in my front too, so I have to stay under 4'.

I do have the area next to the driveway, plus another area that I just finished covering this fall. I was gonna fill it with flowers, but after going through the potager forum, I'm really considering looking into fencing most of my new area and going that route, flowers and veggies combined. I have to see if I can find somebody from craigs list in my area willing to drop aged manure for cheap $$$ if not free. This soil has had no improvement at all (except for some of the driveway section) and I don't have a truck to go pick stuff up any more. I do have a stable my hubby takes me too every summer with the best aged manure, but since getting rid of the truck all I can get at a time are 2 very large totes full. Not even near enough for what I would need for the new area next to my fence if I decided yes on that.

Here's my driveway section.
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It's about 19-20' long starting at the edge of the raised bed going to the corner of the end double driveway and about 10' wide from driveway to evergreen. The section closer to the raised bed gets 8-9 direct afternoon sun than about halfway down it starts going down to about 3-4 hours at the end of afternoon sun. If I could only get the evergreen down, that would open up so much, but my neighber as well as my hubby likes the evergreen.

and here's the new section.
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Each panel is 8' and if I did start 2 panels up, it would give me 32' of length againts the fence and at it's shortest depth is 10'. I don't know how deep it is at the corner. For the spring into summer, this area's gets full starting from sunup to about 3pm, than it starts getting shaded torwards the back for most of the rest of the day. Late summer to fall, part of it gets shaded for a little bit because of 1 of my neighbers maples you can see in the 2nd pic.

I do have to keep the shape though. Having the maple there does limit me. I was thinking maybe starting 2 panels up after the street and than fencing the rest, bit leaving a 2-3' gap at the edges to put flowers and such in front of the fence to pretty it up.

We'll see I guess
Melissa

Melissa,

I love the shape of your new garden and how it lays in your yard. Very attractive with your house. It is going to be beautiful!
~ Annie

Thank you Annie, it was a bit of work, but very worth it. I wish I didn't have the 1 maple right there though. I would have extanded the bed line alot more into the lawn. Maybe a few years from now we can have it taken down. The condition of it (along with 1 other of my maples) is going down hill.

Melissa

Well, take advantage of the lovely maple tree and plant shade-loving plants under it, flowing into your sun-loving plants. It would make it more Cottage-y!
As for the evergreen hedge, take advantage of that too. Use it as a backdrop for tall, colorful, flowering plants, like Delphiniums and peonies. Maybe think about planting a tall, billowy, flowering ornamental tree at the top end (upper left in the photo where your little raised bed sits). It would soften the hard line of the hedge and add color and texture. It would also semi-enclose your yard and make it more private without totally blocking the view.
Play with it on paper and see what you think.
~ Annie