Our First Garden

This year I am embarking on a few new things: Photoshop, Gardening & possibly volunteering to sing for Hospice patients. Today I will share with you my story of a newbie gardener (me). I have also implemented some of my new (but very basic) Photoshop skills on some of my pictures. I enlisted the help of Jeff (not seen in these pics but there will be some soon) and our good little helper, Evan. For those of you who know me well enough, you know that I can't stand being dirty AT ALL!!!!! I am also very, very, very, very grossed out by bugs, worms, etc (perhaps because my sister, Michelle, used to chase me around throwing bugs and worms at me when we were kids). Yes, she tormented me quite a bit. I guess that's what big sisters do :). Anyway, I am trying to overcome those issues for our little man's sake. I want him to be able to be a boy and get dirty and play with bugs without me freaking out. I will warn you that I am very exited about this little venture of gardening and am also aware that it's probably not nearly as exciting for you, but it's my blog so therefore I can say what I want, right? I started off by planting some seeds in hopes of watching them grow from the very beginning...what a bust that was! Out of about 20 or so starts, ONLY 3 sprouted. Discouraged, I scrapped that idea and threw them all away. Jeff & I decided to buy plants and do it that way (it's cheating, I know, but I'm a beginner ;)). Here are some pics of our new adventure...there are a LOT of pics :).

After living at our house for about 11 years now, we are FINALLY starting to do something with our back yard. We had been putting it off because our dogs would have ruined anything that we would have done. We have a lot of work left to do. These are pics of the yard looking toward the neighbors behind us.

We planted tomatoes, basil, and bell peppers in pots and will be growing them on our deck.

I planted basil with the tomatoes because I read that it gives the tomatoes better flavor and keeps flies and mosquitoes away from the tomatoes.

Red bell peppers...

Green bell peppers...

I planted a strawberry patch in what used to be a horseshoe pit (it never got used). Now it will :). I planted a combination of German and Lemon Thyme around the perimeter of the strawberries because I read that it keeps the worms away from the strawberries. I also LOVE the smell of lemon thyme. I am told that the strawberries will spread a lot so I hope to get lots of strawberries in the future...mmmmmm!

I planted 2 different types of strawberries...don't know what the difference is (except that they look a little different) but I guess we'll find out now won't we ;).

Lemon thyme...

German thyme

Well, there you have it, the beginnings of our masterpiece (or so we hope). We still have to plant some different types of lettuce and some chives. We may also plant a couple of blueberry bushes. If we can find the right spot for a bush that likes to "take over" I might get a couple of raspberry bush starts from our neighbor...mmmmmm raspberries. I will keep you updated on our progress. Until then, the adventure continues...