Let's begin with some history. I was raised primarily in California, but when I was 13, I was transplanted to Oklahoma. We moved from the city to 4 acres in the middle of no where... Seminole, Oklahoma. Talk about culture shock! After a month or so in the sticks, I learned to embrace the idea of being in the country.
My most fond memories are of the garden my mom worked so hard on. I hated having to go out there and water the dang thing, but she sure did put a lot of work into it. She even got some brick from the brick plant in the next town and made walkways and aisles. It was very pretty and I sure did love all the fresh veggies. We even had a peach tree up closer to my aunts house on the same property. Man o man, there is nothing better than fresh peach cobbler. At 14 I was picking peaches and whipping up a cobbler for the family. I've always had a thing for cooking, and there was something so rewarding about cooking from your own garden.
Anyway, since my high school days, we've all moved away from Seminole and gone our separate ways. In fact, I'm the only one in my family left in Oklahoma. This is home to me and I love it here. You get to experience all four seasons and their beauty.
So fast forward about 20 years and here I am in Yukon, Oklahoma (just west of Oklahoma City) with my own family. I met a wonderful man almost a year ago and we are building our life together. I've moved out of the apt I was in for about 5 years and we rented a house. Between the two of us we have four kids... and I'm not sure we are stopping there! We are a big family and we love to cook... and we LOVE to eat! LOL
The house is just the perfect size for us (until we complete our 5-year plan lol) and move back to the sticks! The back yard is really big for a city yard and I was thinking about what I could do with all that space. Now of course, we've got kids from 2 to 15, so yard toys and swingsets are a must! But that doesn't nearly fill up my yard. A garden! That would be beautiful, a penny saver at the grocery store and something the whole family could enjoy. Done deal! I'm sold! Now what?!?!
Ok, so over the past couple of weeks I've been playing with garden plans and doing a lot of research on the internet about gardening in Oklahoma. Boy howdy there is a lot of things to know about such a simple idea! I've spent countless hours looking at gardening sites. My love comes out of the room in the middle of the night to check on me from time to time to make sure I haven't fried my brain. I think he's actually jealous of the computer at this point lol.
In my research, I've run across the SFG (square foot gardening) sites and recommendations everywhere. Everything that I've found says it's less work, more fruitful and nice to look at. I decided that would be the way for us to go. Andy is gone to work all day and I work from home and take care of two small children during the day. I also go to school one night a week as well. So it's not like we are a retired couple who can devote an inordinate amount of time to gardening.
Andy and I decided to make a trip to Lowe's to see what we could see. I just wanted to get some seeds and look at the wood so we could get some plans together for the raised beds. HA! We ended up buying everything we needed that day. We decided on 5 x 10 foot beds and we will start out with three of them. We decided to place them in the back of the backyard, and then if we want to put another bed or two back there in the future, we'd still have the space for it. We got all the seeds and peat pellet starter kits, wood, brackets and a bag of soil so I could start my strawberry crowns in buckets too.
Now... it appears we have jumped in with both feet and have no clue what we are doing. Gardening can't be that hard right? LOL. I look at it this way... I've read up on a lot of how to do this and I'm going to take the bull by the horns and run with it. Trial and error. Of all the things we bought to grow, we are bound to get something out of the garden.
The only real drawback for me is that I'm not a rule follower. I can't even follow a recipe without changing the ingredients and altering everything until I'm happy. I've read all the plans and how-to's and the best way for maters according to Jim, and Tim's rules on brussel sprouts, and what fertilizer works best for Martha... but I'm never going to find out how I want to do this until I try it.
So here's what we are going to do...we are going to take this backyard
and we are going to take this wood...
Here's another alteration I'm making to gardening. I'm starting everything from seed in the house with peat pellets and then I'm going to transplant it. I know a lot of things don't transplant well, and if I lose some veggies in the process, I'll know for sure that I shouldn't do that. Trial and error I tell ya! This is as much an experiment as it is a project I seems lol.
So I've got everything started in my peat pellet casings... we are trying corn, bush beans, spinach, tomaters, cukes, squash, zucchini, okra, sunflowers, garlic, onions, bell peppers, hot peppers, radish, carrots and even some brussel sprouts. We opted for bush beans instead of pole beans mostly because I didn't want to mess with trellises. I know I'm going to have to design something for my brussel sprouts and tomaters, but I'll deal with that when I get there. I'll definitely get something in ground before I transplant my goodies, but for today... it's not on my to-do list. I'm still decided if I want to paint my raised beds or not. I've seen some really pretty pictures of ones with plain white on them and I like that. I might do a sunshine yellow or something. My house is white and yellow and I think it might look purty. We'll see if I get that hair or not lol.
Right now, I'm just playing the waiting game. Waiting on Andy to get my raised beds together and waiting for my peat pots to sprout. I may have started too early for some of the stuff... but it's an experiment I tell ya! I'll learn the hard way what NOT to do.
My biggest concern right now is how many of the little boogers to transplant per sq foot. I'm in the middle of designing my bed layout as we speak. I think I'll put the corn, bush beans and squash in one bed... read something about companion gardening and it makes sense. If it worked for the Native Americans for all these years, surely I can do something similar.
From what I've read there is a lot of controversy on how many stalks of corn can grow in a sq foot. I'm thinking I'll put 2 in there and see what happens. I've read about 1 per sq foot up to 4 in that tiny space. I'm thinking I'll put the corn right in the middle and then surround them with the beans and squash. I'm not a tall lady, but I'm sure I'll be able to reach the corn lol. Ok maybe not completely sure, but Andy can get to it if I can't LOL.
The maters I'm thinking need their own squares, and I've got a lot of maters! That might swallow up a whole bed by itself. Ugh! Maybe I'll do half in one bed and half in the last bed. That might be better.
Man, now that I'm trying to put my layout on paper, it seems I might need one more bed lol. I'll talk to Andy about that one. He's my bed putter togetherer. Lucky for me he likes to put on the hard hat and tool belt! I think it's more of the male macho drive and building something than anything else... As long as I have the beds I need I'm good lol.
So... back to the waiting game (and planning the layout). We'll see what happens!
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