Again, Shaela?

New garden bed under costruction

Last year when I first started working in my community garden plot I told the other gardeners that I had to get a plot because N wouldn't let me dig up any more grass.  I was really only half joking.  N likes grass, even our scaggly, patchy grass that doesn't get any fertilizer or water or sun.  Maybe that's why I didn't really ask before digging up our side yard...

The garden bed I put in the backyard a few years ago just gets less sun every year, thanks to my neighbor's incredible, exuberant tree, and I have decided to exchange some of that land (seeded back to grass) for a sunnier spot on the opposite side of the house.  I turned over the sod in the new space, laid down many sheets of paper/cardboard, then moved the top two inches of soil off of the old garden and put it on the new.  (I worked hard building that soil, and moving it made the old garden level with the adjacent lawn.)  I didn't have enough soil to really cover the new space, so I put some of my recently-finished compost on there as well.  Then I covered all of it with the remaining wood chips from my driveway.  (Hooray!  We have a driveway again!)  Between now and next spring the weather and soil life should be able to break down the sod clumps and paper and leave me with a nice, soft, crumbly, humusy soil.  Ha ha ha ha!  Okay, I know better than that, but it will probably be diggable.

Perhaps the liberated driveway was some solace to N when he came home and found me, covered in the evidence of my misdeeds.  He is a patient and understanding man.



N took the news well, probably partly because I used the last of the mulch from the driveway to cover the new bed for winter.