It's Almost Gardening Time Again!

I started this as a Facebook status update, then realized it was getting kind of wordy.  So, blog post!

I bought some seed packets yesterday and am starting to get excited about gardening this year.  I am not, however, excited about clearing out the garden area.  I wish I had cleared out the old stuff last year and covered over the ground.  But I didn't, so now I have more work ahead of me.

Still, it should be easier than last year, when I hadn't touched the area for a few years and the weeds were 2 feet high in some spots of the planter.

This year, I'm planting in a larger area and giving more room to the squash and pumpkin plants in hopes that I will get some good results from them and will avoid the mildew that was such a problem last year.  And I'm going to do more intentional planting in containers, rather than transplanting a ton of stuff because the garden gets too crowded.

AND I'm starting earlier to give things like tomatoes time to actually ripen.  I had so many nice-looking tomato plants with many tomatoes growing on them, but they were all still green when the weather turned cold again, and none ripened.  The first year or two that I tried gardening, I got a number of tomatoes, so I know it's possible.  I just didn't plant until late June last year, which didn't give them enough time.

So far, I've gotten:

• Herbs (sage, sweet basil and oregano)
• Multicolored mixes of carrots and sweet peppers
• Sugar snap peas (a huge favorite of Ben's last year)
• Green beans
• Cucumbers
• Orange Slice Hybrid Tomatoes (excited to try these - their color is awesome)
• Green onions
• and Spinach

I also bought a packet of Marigold seeds to sow around the edges to help cut down on garden pests.

I want to buy butternut and spaghetti squash, zucchini, pumpkins, grape tomatoes, Roma or another type of red tomato (and/or maybe purple heirloom?)...and I think that's it.  Possibly asparagus, but I need to see if that will grow well here.  Oh, and lettuce.  And maybe another herb or two.

I have not gotten to a nursery yet to check out dwarf apple trees, but that is another thing I'd like to plant, this year if I can.  I will probably get 2 trees of different varieties for cross-pollination purposes.

Really hoping that I can get a higher yield this year from the garden, and I think that by planting earlier and giving more room for things to grow, I will.