Annual Vegetable Garden Plans for 2015

When we bought our house in 2012, I was excited about the big side yard in full sun.  The next year we cut in three beds for our vegetable garden totally 264 square feet of bed space.  This year with the goal of feeding our family locally we are adding a fourth bed and extending the existing beds to give ourselves 480 square feet.  I'm so excited to have almost doubled our annual vegetable space.

Above is last year's vegetable garden.  To expand we are adding eight feet to each of the three existing beds and adding a fourth bed over on the right.

Jeff measured the beds out Sunday afternoon so we are ready to cut the sod.  In the brief time when both babes were napping Monday I managed to cut the edges of two of the extended beds using a flat shovel.  I had just started pulling up sod chunks when Sunny woke up.  

While I was working with my shovel the neighbors across the way were using a small tractor to level and spread manure on part of their yard.  Machines are faster, they are also expensive and require fuel.  I had to give myself at little pep talk while I worked, "Hand tools will work just fine; and if we keep plugging our little garden plot will get finished same as theirs."  

The 'Kennebec' and 'Red Adirondack' potatoes arrived in the mail from Johnny's Selected Seeds on Saturday.  (Read how I selected my potatoes in this blog post.)  With the seed potatoes sitting in the mudroom sprouting their eyes, now there is an urgency to getting the garden expansion finished.  And I want to have the veggie garden completely started by the time my farm internship starts the last week of May.  

I did plant the 'Kennebec' potatoes on Easter Sunday.  JuneBug, two and a half years old,  helped plant the "tatoes".  I dug the holes and she put the seed potato in and covered it up with her little trowel.  She told me they would be yummy and she would "eat them all up."  

When I sat down to do the garden plan a week or so ago, I realized even with the garden expansion I won't have room for all the vegetables I am planning to grow.  I have a couple options here:  

1. Make the garden even bigger
2. Plant less
3. Plant some of the veggies in the perennial flower bed.  

Right now, I think planting less and putting some of the lettuce mix and other greens in the flower beds makes the most sense.  There might also be a fourth option, succession planting.  I do some succession planting now, but there could be more.  Maybe I'll learn more about that from the farms.  

After sitting down with my garden map I have decided I do not have enough room to grow sweet potatoes.  I just called Johnny's and canceled my order.  I'm a little sad, but also relieved.  Everything else I wanted to grow now fits in the garden.  This will be the year of the potato for us!

Here's the plan:  

Bed 1:

• 'All Blue' Potatoes
• 'Adirondack Red' Potatoes

Bed 2: 

• 'Dukat' Dill
• 'Kennebec' Potatoes
• Garlic (from RiverRidge Farm)
• 'Candy' Onions
• 'Zeppelin' Onions
• Basil 'Genovese'

Bed 3: 

• 'Harmony' Cucumber
• 'Travoli' Spaghetti Squash
• 'Metro' Butternut Squash

Bed 4:

• 'Piasano' San Marzano type paste tomatoes
• 'Tiren' San Marzano type paste tomatoes
• 'Jasper' Red cherry tomato
• 'Five Star' Red grape tomato
• 'Sun Gold' Yellow cherry tomato
• 'German Butterball' Potato
• 'Calypso' Cilantro
• 'Renegade' Spinach
• 'Rhubarb Red' Swiss Chard

Now to finish digging out the expansion and additional bed.