We have been busy, busy, busy working in the yard. I was determined that we would have things ready in time to get a garden planted before it got too late in the year. When we moved into this house we had a pre-existing orchard area, and last year we built a new fence that was taller (to keep the deer out) and encompassed a larger area (so one day we could have a garden in there); so this year was the year that finally I was going to get my garden that I’ve been dreaming of since we were poor college students living in UCLA student housing.
So this past weekend we got everything in the ground and I cannot wait for the coming months to see everything (hopefully, fingers crossed) start coming up and producing lots of fruits and vegetables. Preparing the space properly was a big job and one that could have easily gotten away from us, but thankfully my parents now live right behind us and since they were going to be sharing our garden space with us (their yard gets a lot more shade than ours does and we have plenty of room) they were a huge help getting everything ready and then planted. I honestly don’t know if we could have had things planted in time without their help. We planted a lot from seeds so there’s not much to see right now, but as soon as there’s a little more green in the garden I’ll have a fun before and after post for you.
Today, though, I’d like to share a simple tutorial for raised planter beds that anyone could do, even if they don’t have and tools or know-how. Instead of constructing them out of wood (which Mike has actually done before), they are simply laid out with concrete cinder blocks, making this a much simpler and cheaper project than a traditional raised planter bed.
The first thing you need to do is decide the size of the bed you want so you can determine how many blocks you’ll need to purchase. Keep in mind the dimensions of the blocks when calculating your planter bed size.
Next, mark out the area in your garden where you want to have your beds. Make sure the area is nice and level and dig out slight indents with a shovel where your blocks will go, this will help keep everything straight and in place.
They might not be the prettiest thing ever but I’m pretty sure they start filling in bushy, green plants you won’t even notice what they look like. I also like like that if you wanted you could paint them any color you wanted or even use chalkboard paint so you can label what you’ve planted!
One of the great things about doing your raised beds this way is that you can use the interior of the blocks to plant herbs, flowers, or smaller plants. I can’t wait until everything fills in and we can start enjoying all our hard work. For now I’m enjoying the satisfaction of seeing how far our garden/orchard area has come since we’ve bought the house.
