Not quite what we had planned today, but a bit of shopping. We headed to Ho-Depot to pick up a few solar patio lights. We had picked up some on Friday from the clearance section but still needed a few more and guess what? They had been discounted further so we not only got the discount on the ones we picked up today but we had the receipt from Friday with us and they discounted those as well. We also picked up the fence posts for the small fence we are going to erect at the back of our vegetable garden. It will be used to prop up blackberry and raspberry bushes. We also had to make a quick stop at Home Hardware to pick up some stakes and the grocery store so by the time we got home, it was after 1pm. Did I mentioned my wakeup was not quite as early as was conveyed to me a few days back. It was before 9am, but not much. What would you rather have, someone who slept in a bit or a crunchy partner...crunchy being cranky and grouchy combined? I say well rested.
Now to the Honey-Do List....Project #1 – Lasagna Garden....so, what is Lasagna Gardening? It is an old method of gardening also known as “No Dig Gardening”. The benefits are that, once assembled, there is minimal upkeep with virtually no weeding and it is supposed to produce a bountiful garden. I have been reading Patricia Lanza’s series of books on the subject. Lasagna Gardening can be practiced in small beds and large, even in containers. It can be used for annual, perennials, vegetables and herbs. As stated previously, there is no digging and no tilling required to make the garden. You don’t even have to take up the sod. It is created by placing layers of brown and green organic material on top of wet newspaper. What does take a fair amount of time is accumulating the material. We have been stashing materials since we first arrived in PEI. Newspapers, leaves, grass clippings, compost materials, hay or straw, etc.
Here's our garden gnome before gardening.
And here's who came for a visit while we were making the garden. The gall of this litte foxie, squatting to pee in our future veggie garden while the 3 of us just sat and watched.
Today we got about 50% of it done and took us a couple of hours. We started out by haphazardly laying out the plot. I’ll fix it later once the layers bake down. We started out trying to use our garden hose but it wasn’t flexible enough so we ended up using some garden trim and a couple of stakes
Next step, soak the paper in an old plastic container filled with water.
We used newspaper, packing paper that we saved from our move and I actually threw in some old sewing patterns that I had left over after purging. My parents will get a kick out of this picture.
I made my Dad this housecoat when I was in high school. The housecoat is long gone after many, many years of use but hopefully the memory of love invested in making it and even more love returned by actually wearing it as much as he did. Without giving away my age, you could venture a guess by the artwork. A packrat I am, but at least I finally put it to use again.
Once the newspaper is soaked, you lay down thick overlapping layers. Try to NOT stop to read the stories as you place them in the garden or you will be there all day.
Next, a layer of peat moss....notice mine is a product of Canada.
.
Then a layer of compost – looks disgusting right. Our compost is made up of old barn litter that Ev collected from the local race track, and compost that we collect on daily basis. We have a small compost container under our kitchen sink. It has fruit and vegetable scraps, coffee grinds, egg shells, King Cole tea bags (E’s new fave...made in New Brunswick and the preferred tea of the Maritimes), shells collected from the beach, the inedible remains of a few lobsters, and some paper towels. I also throw the paper in there from my shredder.
May I also suggest you get yourself this incredible "tool" for digging your compost out, transporting it to your garden and shoveling it in;)
It works great for me! (This is the little service area in our yard. It's tucked behind our garage in the backyard. Also, see our green rainbarrel. It will collect rain that we can use for our garden in the future.)
Then another layer of peat and top that off with a fine layer of grass clippings.
By that point we were ready to pack it in for the day. We covered up the garden for the night. The end result is that there should be enough layers to build up the garden somewhere between 18 and 24 inches and then you cover it with dark plastic so that the light can't get at it and you let it cook. After several weeks it should all break down and produce a rich dark soil ready to be planted.
Note the condition of our garden gnome at the end of a hard day. He truly had a "ruff" day! I know, bad, right?
Now to the Honey-Do List....Project #1 – Lasagna Garden....so, what is Lasagna Gardening? It is an old method of gardening also known as “No Dig Gardening”. The benefits are that, once assembled, there is minimal upkeep with virtually no weeding and it is supposed to produce a bountiful garden. I have been reading Patricia Lanza’s series of books on the subject. Lasagna Gardening can be practiced in small beds and large, even in containers. It can be used for annual, perennials, vegetables and herbs. As stated previously, there is no digging and no tilling required to make the garden. You don’t even have to take up the sod. It is created by placing layers of brown and green organic material on top of wet newspaper. What does take a fair amount of time is accumulating the material. We have been stashing materials since we first arrived in PEI. Newspapers, leaves, grass clippings, compost materials, hay or straw, etc.
Here's our garden gnome before gardening.
And here's who came for a visit while we were making the garden. The gall of this litte foxie, squatting to pee in our future veggie garden while the 3 of us just sat and watched.
Today we got about 50% of it done and took us a couple of hours. We started out by haphazardly laying out the plot. I’ll fix it later once the layers bake down. We started out trying to use our garden hose but it wasn’t flexible enough so we ended up using some garden trim and a couple of stakes
Next step, soak the paper in an old plastic container filled with water.
We used newspaper, packing paper that we saved from our move and I actually threw in some old sewing patterns that I had left over after purging. My parents will get a kick out of this picture.
I made my Dad this housecoat when I was in high school. The housecoat is long gone after many, many years of use but hopefully the memory of love invested in making it and even more love returned by actually wearing it as much as he did. Without giving away my age, you could venture a guess by the artwork. A packrat I am, but at least I finally put it to use again.
Once the newspaper is soaked, you lay down thick overlapping layers. Try to NOT stop to read the stories as you place them in the garden or you will be there all day.
Next, a layer of peat moss....notice mine is a product of Canada.
.
Then a layer of compost – looks disgusting right. Our compost is made up of old barn litter that Ev collected from the local race track, and compost that we collect on daily basis. We have a small compost container under our kitchen sink. It has fruit and vegetable scraps, coffee grinds, egg shells, King Cole tea bags (E’s new fave...made in New Brunswick and the preferred tea of the Maritimes), shells collected from the beach, the inedible remains of a few lobsters, and some paper towels. I also throw the paper in there from my shredder.
May I also suggest you get yourself this incredible "tool" for digging your compost out, transporting it to your garden and shoveling it in;)
It works great for me! (This is the little service area in our yard. It's tucked behind our garage in the backyard. Also, see our green rainbarrel. It will collect rain that we can use for our garden in the future.)
Then another layer of peat and top that off with a fine layer of grass clippings.
By that point we were ready to pack it in for the day. We covered up the garden for the night. The end result is that there should be enough layers to build up the garden somewhere between 18 and 24 inches and then you cover it with dark plastic so that the light can't get at it and you let it cook. After several weeks it should all break down and produce a rich dark soil ready to be planted.
Note the condition of our garden gnome at the end of a hard day. He truly had a "ruff" day! I know, bad, right?
My exhausted overworked garden tool...and trusty gnome.
Night all!
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