New Garden Beds

This project was not necessarily in my plans for this year.

However, with that being said when hubby agrees to something I am more than happy to jump in there and do it. He told me he'd be willing to help if I didn't plant any more raspberries in these beds. (I don't hear him complaining when he is eating raspberry jam....)

This is what the back garden area looked like before we did anything. 10' x 12' raspberry patch on the left and garage/woodpile on the right.

Planning stage--4' x 8' raised vegetable beds. Inspired by our Aunt Gayle's garden--she is hardcore and always has LOTS of yummy garden produce.

Originally we were going to use railroad ties ($7.99/ea), but it ended up being cheaper to buy 8' landscape timbers and layering them. ($1.97/ea on sale at Home Depot)

Hubby cut the timbers in half for the ends and then we laid them out where we wanted them, making sure to leave room between each for the lawnmower to pass. Aunt Gayle just kills all the grass around/between her beds because she doesn't want to deal with it. You can make that choice for yourselves. I knew hubby wouldn't go for that particular idea.

We left the timbers laid out for about a week and it left the impression in the yard so that when we rented the sod cutter (also at Home Depot) he would know where to cut. Otherwise you'll need to mark off the area somehow. I highly recommend renting a sod cutter. For us it was $53/4hr. time period, and even though we were done in a half hour it sure beat shoveling it out by hand for hours on end. Plus we moved the cut sod to a different spot in our yard that needed some TLC. (Kids and dogs are rough on lawns) We also shared the cost of the sod cutter with some friends who needed it for only an hour too. It worked GREAT!

Here is hubby lining up the boards and getting ready to secure it all in place.

Here we are all completed and filled in with dirt.

We bought a cubic yard of black dirt at a local nursery here for $25. It filled the back of our pick-up and then I put the kids to work (I helped too) with shovels and wheelbarrows to move it from the truck to the garden beds. One cubic yard filled both beds.

I don't know how much garden produce we will actually get this year. Planting mid-June is not the ideal time, but we added some more tomatoes, zucchini, cucumber, broccoli, green peppers, and honeydew. We'll see what we actually get. I still have more room to plant some things, but I think that I am done for now. And we'll be more than ready for next year's planting and harvest.

Total cost:

2 - 4'x8' beds, dirt, and sod cutter rental---$100.