Winter is coming

It's been a busy few weeks for me, both in the garden and in our house.  At the moment, we're enjoying a true day of rest.  I'm sitting on our porch swing listening to the breezes and reveling in the chillier weather.  I love colder weather, so the larger part of me is rejoicing.  But the other part is glancing around worriedly at my plants wondering what will survive the coming winter months.  I've heard rumors that our complete lack of winter last year is leading towards an especially icy one this year.  I'll believe it when I see it.

I had a friend over to watch one of the presidential debates last week.  We ended up drinking a bottle of wine and talking permaculture, which was so much better than talking politics.  We stood around my yard long after the debate was over, tossing around ideas for my land.  As in most things, a fresh set of eyes is so helpful.  She glanced over at the retaining wall dividing our house from the neighbors' and suggested that I try putting tomatoes beside it.  In the spring. 

I was too excited at the idea of another edible-friendly growing place in my limited landscape to wait for spring.  So I went out the next day and bought a raspberry and a blackberry bush at a 75% discount and made a berry bed.  I told my friend later that I felt like she'd told me where to dig for gold.  The grass hadn't grown well in that particular spot, which made me so happy.  The fewer battles I have to fight with bermuda the better.  Instead, the ground was covered with a natural layer of leafy mulch and clover, and the soil was full of earthworms. 

I've always wanted to grow berries, and I didn't think I'd ever have a place for them on my own land.  And let's be honest, they still might not grow.  We have several beautiful (and annoying) crepe myrtles that provide so much wonderful (and super annoying) shade.  The unfortunate placement of a sprinkler head forced me to move the bed down further into the occasional shade of the house.  And on top of all that, I have no experience growing berries, and they may not survive my learning curve.  But it makes me happy that I have a place to try.

I removed what ground cover was there, put down a good bit of peat moss, mushroom compost and regular compost.  I mulched around the plants and watered in some liquid humus in an attempt to further improve the soil. (As good as it was in comparison to the rest of my soil, it still needs some help.)  Then I decided to plant some arugula and lettuce in the wide open spaces around the berries.  Gideon helped me plant this arugula (in a very haphazard fashion), and it's required a lot of thinning.  I took some bites of the seed leaves during thinning... mmm, spicy and delicious.  There's really nothing like eating what you've grown yourself, even if it's barely a mouthful.

I dug up these two huge rocks while I was preparing the bed.  I'm not sure what Gideon and his stick were trying to accomplish with them, but he was working hard and happy.