5.19.2011

Jumping Through Hoops

If you remember, I'm now a gardener by trade. Sort of. It's been so much fun for me to learn so many new things about gardening. And, to have so much space (and a greenhouse!) in the city is pretty luxurious. I feel so blessed that for the first time ever, I will be able to grow most of the vegetables I'll be eating all summer. Now if only I could grow bananas and oranges and such.

That being said, it's been a hella cold spring. Which means that despite many, many hours of readying the raised beds, we have not been able to transplant anything outside. We had an overnight frost two weeks ago, and last week it went from 80 degrees to 40 degrees in two days! So nuts! I am so sad, too, because the squash plants are starting to blossom! What a waste. I'm going to try to pollinate them myself, but it's getting to be a bad scene. And let's face it, I'm not a biologist. I'm not so sure me poking different squash blossoms with a Q-tip is going to do much. I just have to keep telling myself that there will be an inordinate amount of squash blossoms in my future, which will be pollinated and will become beautiful squashes.

In an effort to jump start the growing season outside, and keep critters away (we're plagued with rabbits, squirrels, and giant crows so far), we built a hoop house. It was also an excuse for me to try out some of the projects I'd read about online. And there are so, so many! I want to build a potato box, turn storage containers into self-watering planters, build a pallet garden, and a succulent wall! Not to mention all the things I'm learning about growing plants in a greenhouse, composting (for which I started a huge program at my work), and gardening in general that I want to try out.

I digress, though. As I said before, the one project that I have attacked so far is to build a hoop house. I've built one, and I'm planning on building two more. The hoop house instructions that I used were from this video:



The directions are incredibly clear, and super easy, though I did have someone help me with the math, just in case. Anyway, I'd like to share some photos of the hoop house I built (along with my brother's help), and some updated photos of all my plants.



1 comment:

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...