DIY Garden

We planted a garden.

Flowers in our new DIY garden.  Photo by coreanscribe.

It was my wife’s idea. It was a good one.

We live in a small four-unit building with a tiny patch of yard in the back. Behind that, elevated, lies an even smaller patch of dirt. That’s what I saw any way: a useless patch of dirt. My wife saw something entirely different; she saw potential. So, she claimed it her own and quickly put a plan together.

The secret backyard garden.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Herb garden and planter box garden.  Photo by coreanscribe.

I don’t know anything about gardening but my wife — thankfully — seemed to know a little more. Even with her bit of knowledge though, we needed help.

We visited the nearest Home Depot nursery during the Memorial Day weekend and loaded up on supplies to get started. We asked for a lot of advice and got some helpful tips, such as planting Marigolds to help naturally drive away critters; those bright little flowers apparently release an unpleasant scent. In fact, one of the Home Depot workers told us that the Disneyland groundskeepers even plant Marigolds all around the park to keep unwelcome guests out.

We ended up with a modest-sized raised planter box made of wood and a separate smaller plastic planter just for herbs.

Marigolds guarding the perimeter.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Wild strawberries.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Cucumber plant.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Tomato plants.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Lilacs next to the tomato plants.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Grassy-looking chives.  Photo by coreanscribe.

Growing herbs.  Photo by coreanscribe.

We think we’ve gotten off to a great start. Time will tell, but we can already see that the starter plants have taken well to their new home and are quickly growing. Now comes the tough part, maintaining and taking care of the garden. My wife really seems committed to it so I hope to see it thrive and look forward to enjoying what it produces.

I’m a bit more lazy what it comes to things like this so I prefer plants that are low maintenance. That’s why I like Bonsai trees. They’re durable and get better with age.

Bonsai trees.  Photo by corenscribe.

So, when we visited the Home Depot nursery, I decided to pick up another one with the idea of starting my own garden — a lazy garden.

New member of the Bonsai family.  Photo by coreanscribe.

And just to prove I was really lazy, I even brought home a small dish of cacti.

Small dish of cacti.  Photo by coreanscribe.

So far, so good. If I can keep these guys alive, which shouldn’t be too much work, I’ll think about expanding even more to the lazy collection next year. But, I might be too lazy to do it.