Welcome to the Organic Gardening page where you'll see some of our gardens and find the philosophy and background for all of the do-able gardening techniques you'll find here.
My goal is to demystify growing food and flowers to enable you to garden on whatever level you'd like!
Our Former One Acre Gardens at the Cottage:
The raised bed vegetable garden.
The berry patch.
The backyard.
Our Current Farmhouse Yard & Garden:
The future raised bed vegetable garden.
GO HERE to see what it looks like four years later!
The future herb & flower garden.
GO HERE to see what this deer resistant sunken garden looks like now!
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My Gardening Background
I didn't grow up gardening, other than being made to weed the little patch my mom had on and off and pick lettuce for dinner (both chores I hated).
When I married and we bought our first house, I read all I could, learned by trial and error and eventually surrounded it with English-style flower gardens. I added a couple of raised beds because it fit in the plan and my Organic Gardening magazine said I should. I only wanted to grow some tomatoes and lettuce.
Surprisingly to me, those first few plants gave me a thrill to be able to grow our own food and I planted more and more vegetables, turning our 50x100 lot into a production machine.
I learned to can salsa and tomato chutney and pickle green beans. I took over some flower beds - and dreamed of having more land.
My dream came true when we were able to move to an acre in the country. I had a huge raised bed vegetable garden and flower borders to my heart's content.
And more maintenance than I ever could imagine - I found out that country weeds are nothing like city weeds.
So I started developing easy, doable gardening techniques so I could spend more time harvesting and enjoying our yard.
Things like no-till vegetable gardening, using plastic to combat pernicious weeds, layering beds with paper and mulch, using soaker hoses, edging, and permanent paths. Basically anything I could do to lessen the maintenance.
A few years ago we sold and moved to our farmhouse with a blank slate of a yard.
We're in the process of creating the vegetable garden from this plan, as well as a sunken flower and herb garden from an area we had to excavate for a new foundation that you see above.
Why Organic Gardening?
Luckily, I didn't grow up with any preconceived ideas, so when I started educating myself on gardens, organic gardening made the most sense: it was better for my family, for the environment, and a LOT cheaper than buying a lot of herbicides and fertilizers.
I found I could top my raised beds AND flower gardens once a year with a good mulch and I didn't need any extra fertilizers, except for the slow-release organic fertilizer I add to planting holes for vegetables.
Taking care of the soil - not compacting it and feeding it with compost - provided me with amazing vegetables.
Covering beds with floating row covers kept most of the bugs at bay - and when I couldn't, this homemade bug spray worked like a charm.
So for me - and I hope for you - organic + easy techniques = gardening anyone can do.
Start your own garden or find ways to streamline what you're already doing with some of these ideas:
Gardening Tips
Gardening Tips, Tools & Techniques
Vegetables: Harvest Updates & Information
Flowers: Beds, Borders & Favorites