Planning the growing season

If I haven't updated the blog as recently as we might have liked, blame the weather. It is unseasonably warm and lovely, filling my head with dreams of this summer's garden.

Since we recently moved into our home, this season is the first to start painting on the canvas of our property. While a little lawn is nice (impromptu croquet anyone?) on the whole I would rather have flowers, vegetables, fruiting shrubs, etc. Accordingly, I've been surrounding myself with gardening books, catalogs and websites to decide what should replace the ragged verge (Voles. Whole separate problem).

We have a little patch of sun (square foot vegetable garden), a patch of mostly sun next to the blueberries (raspberries, possibly semi-dwarf apple trees), a sun/shade hill (native plants, prairie plants, lilies), and an area of shade (lilies-of-the-valley, ferns, bleeding hearts). In front of the house are a few warm sunny spots where the herbs will go.

I think my most exciting experiment will be trying a few Honeyberry trees. They are native to Asia but reportedly grow well here, have elongated blueberry like fruit that ripen before strawberries, and grow well in partial shade! They grow 6-8' or 3-4' tall depending on the variety and you need more than one plant to have mature fruit... I'm think a hedge of 4 right now.

The craft show last weekend went swimmingly - met some great folks, sold a few items, and got the year started out right! Thanks to JenDederichPhotography for the great pics!