I thought about linking this week’s SundayStills with the post I published on December 30 but then I suddenly there was an entire portion I completely forgot happened in 2022 – the garden.

I know I’ve already reflected on the 2022 garden but I completely forgot about all the preparation that went into the garden in early 2022 as well as the month-by-month progress. I hope you enjoy a look back on the garden from January to October since I don’t really have an indoor garden at the end of 2022.

January

I guess gardening season came early last year as I was starting flower seeds indoors in January. Meanwhile, I had my very own fresh spinach to harvest. I miss those days when I had fresh leafy greens.

February

They grow up so fast, don’t they?

March

Things came alive in the front garden in March while my indoor garden saw some new additions – more flowers! I started using peat pallet to save time and mess of putting soil in the cells but I think I’ll switch back to using cell trays this year.

April

I think there’re probably about a dozen lessons to be learned here. I started way too many seeds. April 1 was the “4-6 weeks before last frost” mark, and there are a lot of plants like tomatoes that must be started at this time. I started them all on April 1 using peat pallets. There were 50 peat pallets in total.

Within a week, they all germinated and it grew up from there. By the end of the month, I was spending an average of 30 minutes per day carrying them outside from my living room to get them prepped for transplanting. I later learned some of the plants like beans don’t need to be started indoors. I won’t have these many seedlings this year, I’ll guarantee you on that.

May

2022 was my first year of having a proper vegetable garden.

In 2021, I grew cucumbers and tomatoes in grow bags while the rest of the garden overran with volunteer cherry tomatoes and unproductive summer squash plants. I had leafy greens growing out of my Greenstalk Vertical planter in Fall 2021 so that was my first attempt of growing any leafy greens. I had herbs and flowers growing alongside vegetables, which I did not expect to get this big. The end product at grocery stores are always so small.

June

June saw flowers in bloom from both the front and back garden. Personally, I thought the flowers in the back garden looked the prettiest. 😁 Meanwhile, leafy greens were ready to harvest and so were the peas. Some were already bolting (going to seed) because of the heat.

I had to leave the ladder in the garden so I can access it when I need to apply a layer of shade over the plants to keep it from flowering. When leafy greens flower, the leaves grow bitter and even inedible. Peas can fry and die in temperatures over 80 degrees.

I’m definitely changing tactics this year but planting these cool-weather vegetables somewhere shady.

July

I decided to yank the carrots and daikon radishes from the Greenstalk Towers in July so I could get something else in. It was my first time growing carrots and I think it was so small because there wasn’t enough nutrient in the soil and the soil was compacted from me pressing on it too much. Oops. 😬 I will need to re-work the soil in each of the tiers come spring.

August

August saw so many beans. I also saw the garden turning wild, which was something I was trying to avoid – the tomatoes were getting unruly despite having a weekly prune. I guess that’s what happens when it’s given full sun and plenty of water.

The biggest mistake I made in August was not starting fall crops. I thought with the warm soil, I could just sow the seeds directly, thus saving me having to fuss about with the seed-starting trays. I couldn’t be more wrong. Fall crops must be started indoors because it won’t germinate in hot soil. I think if I did start the seeds, I would have some fresh vegetables now because I would’ve planted some in a container I can take inside.

September

September was more or less the penultimate. The bush beans still gave a little bit. I should’ve pull it out but I was too hopeful. Darn, this curse of mine. Meanwhile, I was pulling quite a bit of beans from the pole beans. So I guess that’s good.

Oh, did I mention it was raspberry season?

October

October saw another wave of blooms in the garden as the garden decided to go out with a bang, by showing off its spectacular colors.

It was still raspberry season.

After the frost came and wiped out almost everything, I decided it was the perfect time to put in 2 new raised beds – for to house my strawberries and blueberries bushes and the other one to plant my 2023 veggies.

After taking out the summer crops, I used the remains of those crops as the base for the new raised bed. It was the perfect way to reduce waste and it’s a great way to give nutrient to the soil while save money on bagged soil. Right now, probably only about half of the large empty bed is filled with actual soil. I’m very looking forward to planting in that bed this year.

#SundayStills