Our Own Community Garden

We decided this year to extend our backyard space to friends who live close by, don't have an outdoor area, and who love gardening and fresh food like us. Though it's stretching the concept of community garden a wee bit, it's our own personal interpretation of it.

We all have met and discussed what veggies, fruit, and flowers we'd like to grow, as well as where and how to grow them. It's been great learning both from our friends' knowledge of gardening as well as they good books we now have in our ever-growing library.

Here are some great books that helped us get started:
* Garden Anywhere by Alys Fowler
* All New Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew
* You Grow Girl by Gayle Trail
* A Year on the Garden Path: A 52-Week Organic Gardening Guide by Carolyn Herriot
* Compost by the publishers of Rodale Organic Gardening Basics magazine

This past weekend, we made a huge dent in the garden. A beautiful day perfect for gardening allowed us to fill container boxes with soil and some actual goods! J and a wonderful friend made the boxes a couple of weeks ago - and we made one especially for Gumball! (our baby to be, not our lovely cat, who also loves the outdoors!)Now we just have to stay on top of watering the little lovelies. Already, there are some great things growing in the garden (from last year) like Laurel, Chives, Mint, Raspberries, Marigolds, Currants, Sorel, Rhubarb, Green Onions, Garlic, and more. This past weekend, we planted veggies like zucchini, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, more herbs (basil, lavendar thyme), as well as some great flowers like sweet peas, zinnias, cosmos, coneflowers, and hollyhock.

We're on a tight budget as well as trying to stay organic. Not always things that work together well. We also have to cover the lovely work so that the stray cats and other outdoor critters don't just jump in. When we can, we'll take away the barricade, and put cayenne pepper done - humans 1, stray cats 0! I also love how none of us have a car, but we managed just fine carting stuff around - with quite the handy contraption, i'd say. Speaking of handiness, don't you just love the reused NDP sign used as a wall for Gumball's garden?

We have a lot more to do, but after this week and the great teamwork with our friends, we're pretty optimistic. We're all already dreaming about community dinners focused around our bounty - dishes made solely from our garden like Tomato and Basil Tarts, gazpacho soup, garlic salads, zucchini fries...mmm! Thanks for all the great teamwork everyone!