The Beginning

The Beginning

I don't have a picture of the yard before my brother Matthew built my raised beds, but I do have some construction pictures!  I was recovering from knee replacement surgery so we went HIGH!  I had seen a picture on pinterest and knew that was what I wanted.  We put cardboard down in the bottom, followed by several bags of leaves.  I then layered 6-8 in diameter logs on the bottom and covered with more leaves.  Once it was filled with leaves I mixed Mel's Mix for the upper few inches.  I planted it with lots of plants from my house in Illinois and just used it as a holding bed this summer.  I learned that I should have covered it with topsoil and let it settle because I found it sank about a foot as the leaves broke down.  The next two beds have the cardboard and logs in them and will get filled with leaves this fall. I will be putting in two more of these so I can rotate my annual crops through them.  I couldn't be more pleased with how these worked out.  I will have a soaker hose hooked up to each one.

Sinking them in and making sure they were level.  I really like the fact that I can sit on the sides and reach across each bed.  They are 4 feet by 8 feet and hold a heck of a lot of dirt!

I am putting all of the grass clippings from the catcher on my battery powered mower in between the beds.  I can do one third of the yard on a single charge, which means it takes me 3 days to mow all of it.  Looking forward to creating a more productive landscape.  I would rather be weeding and harvesting than mowing!