Spring Gardening

We've been doing a tremendous amount of yard work lately. Mostly garden and plant work. I've been digging up and moving some plants, transplanting potted plants, moving compost around, harvesting vermicompost, adding more dirt to the garden beds, planting veggie starts, caring for baby veggie seedlings and enjoying some of the warmer late winter/early spring days as they come.

 I dug up, brought home and potted my Daphne bush from the big house. I added a ton of worm poop, good compost and a lot of love to it and it seems to be happy so far. It smells heavenly! I still plant to dig up a hydrangea bush, a small magnolia tree and a few other plants that I meant to bring over a long time ago.

 My worm bin was just crawling with goodness! Tons of valuable worm poop just waiting to be used. I spent an entire afternoon separating the worms and little tiny pieces of plastic (those pesky plastic envelope windows that snuck into the paper shredder) from the vermicompost. It was worth it though.

Ezra thoroughly enjoyed getting his hands on some worms and poop. My helper!

Even with all the compost and dirt I made last fall, I was still in great need of more dirt to fill up my garden beds. I convinced my husband we could wheelbarrow loads of dirt from a construction company that sells fill dirt, literally 3 a quarter of a block away from us. It turned into a way bigger task than I had in mind. Our wheelbarrow handle broke on the first trip. We borrowed two different neighbors wheelbarrows, but they had issues as well. In the end, Armando still managed to hobble several loads of dirt to my garden. I'm sure our neighbors were entertained (hey, it's the least we can do with all the entertainment they provide us).

I also had one more garden bed to start the process of making more dirt - I'll be laying down layers of chicken poop, straw, leaves, cut grass, dirt, rotten food, worms, rabbit poop, ash, egg shells, etc, etc...It will be my late spring/early summer bed for tomatoes, peppers and other warmer climate plants. Or maybe it'll be my herb garden plot...haven't decided.

We planted rows of carrots and radish seeds in between the kale and broccoli starts in one bed

These kids never get bored with digging for worms, then feeding them to the chickens. The garden beds I added the layers of stuff to make dirt with last fall are filled with huge earthworms! Dozens of them. I made some bad ass dirt!

 I re-potted some of my indoor plants since I now had lots of dirt, compost and vermicompost to make a nice potting soil mix with. Here's a plant my sister gave me for Christmas, finally potted in a nice pot.

 Seedlings! Broccoli, Tomatoes, Basil and Green Peppers

When I laid down the third raised bed, I had to move the strawberry patch. I filled two pots with strawberry plants, then created a smaller patch for the rest.

The garden! Lots of work done, lots left to do.

 I found this perfect and cozy lawn chair set on the side of the road the other day (along with a few other great things). A great spot to sit and relax after working hard.