How Does Your Garden Grow?

We're just about settled in at the new house. I still have some work to do on the guest room and the garage, but I feel really good about where we're at with the rest of the rooms. My favorite part of this house though? The garden. Right after we moved in, I planted some vegetables and sunflowers in the garden boxes in the backyard, and since I've never grown some of these things from seed before, I just kind of crossed my fingers and hoped they'd grow. And they did! I was so excited to see things popping up. I'm still singing and reading to my carrots every day, because they look a little sad, but just about everything else is thriving. These pictures are from a few days ago, and yesterday I had to go out and thin my rows, because I didn't expect so many plants to come in! So some of my plants may look a little crowded in these photos, but things look different today.

garden beans

corn

pumpkins

sunflowers

hydrangeas

We bought hydrangea bushes for my sister's wedding on June 14, so once all of those festivities were over my mom had lots of hydrangeas to give away. I planted a bright pink one in the front yard, and so far it's doing well. I hope it grows quickly! I've been working on the front yard, doing some mulching and pruning and planting some ground cover. We have a big yard that's not cheap to water, so I'm doing some preliminary xeriscaping, particularly in areas that are hard to mow. I took some purple ground cover that I don't know the name of from my mother-in-law's garden, and it's about to go to seed so I'm hoping that spreads quickly as well.

I have lots of ideas for our yard and garden, but I have to keep reminding myself to slow down, because we can't afford to do all of it at once.

The previous owner of our house left a pallet garden for me in the backyard. I tried to grow some herbs out of it, but nothing came up. I don't think I planted things quite right. Does anyone have tips for growing a pallet garden? I'll probably have to wait until next year to try anything in there again, but I'd like to start planning! I'm also having an issue with something eating my garden bean leaves - maybe aphids. I'm open to any and all gardening advice!

In other news, my best friend is coming to visit! I am counting down the days, folks. I haven't seen her since November! Expect lots of pictures of her standing in front of big rocks.

Happy Friday friends!