Hi Rick, very small garden here ... less than 150 sq. ft. A third of that is flowers and herbs, so there's not much room for tomatoes and peppers. Still have chard and dill from the fall garden, but I'll need to pull more of that to squeeze in a few more tomatoes. We started the garden about 20 years ago using the square foot method. After that first year abandoned some of Mel's guidelines and set our own. You quickly learn what works and what doesn't. Hope to completely redo the garden next year. Make it a little bigger with wider paths and different shaped beds. Al, sounds like you have a nice variety. I start my tomatoes & peppers on top of the fridge then move them to the cold frame. In the past week the tomatoes outgrew it, so I started transplanting. cold frame in February: the garden today: Harper

Hmmm, I see.... Thank you again, all, for so much valuable information! I am wondering about that "evergreen huckleberry". We have a ton of, to the best of my ID skills, Vaccinium parvifolium, which seems to be commonly named tall huckleberry and red huckleberry. This is great news to me as I was missing the Vaccinium scorparium of the rockies, what we called whortleberry. The fruits are pretty much the same taste and we are picking them tomorrow so we can make a sauce and some muffins with them. Yay! Is there another one out there? Or, is this V. parvifolium the same as the evergreen version mentioned in the first reply to my original post? I am not normally a greedy person, but, yeah, I want them all...allllll And, yes, Bboy, I certainly will not work the soil when wet. Back in CO, everything is clay. Might as well just dig it up and make some pots while I'm at it!! I think the soil here is not so bad. It does seem to have a touch of clay but nothing like I had to work with before. Waiting to work the "soil" was not fun as it was sopping wet from snow melt through June. Frankly, the soil here seems quite loamy, must be all the trees and their bark and needles? I'm also wondering if we're gonna need to put in a french drain! The ground is so damp! I'm guessing I'll just do raised beds and maybe add a touch of sand. Haven't decided yet. Once my father is back home and done with his treatment, I'll be able to focus on the garden. For now, I've got my one new plant to look at and love. We bought a small Acer palmatum dissectum attropurpurea (um? a?) I never remember if it is attropurpurea or um! It follows a lovely downward arching pattern and has a fancy, new ceramic pot. Makes the deck look nice but doesn't really put out any tomatoes or carrots! Well, I thank you all for the suggestions. I'm off to check out Plant Picks.

Yeah, welcome! I'm a transplant too. Agreed about the impressive people you generally meet here. George

Welcome!!! I too, am new to SFG. Last year, I paid for someone to dig some beds out around the foundation of the house, figuring I would plant perennials. When all was said and done, because of my impending divorce, I didn't want to spend money on perennials and instead, threw cuc's, tomatoes, eggplant, peppers and basil in the beds (if you haven't guessed yet, I am italian.) :-) They did so well and with that, I became addicted to gardening!!! This year, I am building four 8 x 4 beds in the yard. And will also use the beds around the foundation for more veggies. Why bother planting stuff on the sides of the house when I can grow something that we can eat??? It will fill in during the summer and nobody will see them in the winter. BUT, while my house may not be the nicest in the winter months, the impact my garden had on my neighborhood last summer was priceless. I am a newly single mom. I bought out my ex's equity in the house. As a single mom, owning a home is a little daunting. But my little garden helped me with that!!! Before having a garden, I didn't know my neighbors. Our houses are pretty far apart. Last summer, while bringing extra veggies to my next door neighbor, he introduced me to his next door neighbor. So I started leaving baggies of fresh veggies on his mailbox when I had extra. He in turn, introduced me to another neighbor and so on and so on etc. Now, a year later, we all know each other. And have since become friends. And knowing that I am a single mom with two little kids, they now look out for me. They have helped me tremendously. They help fix clogged drains. Taught me how to spackle. Told me to turn off water pipes going to the outside faucets in the fall. All the little things that you need to know when you own a home. They have even sent over the "construction" guys when they were doing home improvements to see if I needed help with anything. And sometimes, when I get up too late to bring the garbage to the curb, I find that someone else pulled it from the side of my garage and my garbage is taken out. Through my little garden and extra veggies that I gave away, I have gotten more help than I could ever hope from my ex!!! My intentions when giving away the veggies was simply that they wouldn't go to waste. I wasn't looking for anything in return and honestly felt that knowing and becoming friends with the neighbors was really nice. While I appreciate all of their help, nothing proved more important to me than last week. I was on the phone with a friend and happened to look out my kitchen window. And saw the mental, schizo, bipolar neighbor sitting at my outdoor table. In his boxers. And taking off his shirt. And it was 40 degrees out. I immediately called the cops. Then called my neighbor across the street and asked her if her husband could come over and stay with us until the cops came. He was here within one minute. I was comfortable knowing that a guy was in the house with us. But the wife called all of the other neighbors. Within five minutes later, I had 5 more people in my living room to stay with me. And another mom in the neighborhood took my five year old and three year old to her house while I waited for the police. The police came a few minutes later. I've never felt so threatened yet so safe at the same time. And it all stemmed from my few cucumber, tomato, eggplant, pepper and basil plants that produced too much!!!