I finally did it!

I finally put together my brand-new raised bed in the garden and filled it with brand-new soil. It’s a 8-feet by 2-feet by 17-inches deep metal raised bed. As I have done with my previous 2 metal raised bed, I used the Hugelkultur method, which saved me quite a bit on soil.

For anyone who don’t know what the Hugelkultur method is, it’s where I layer the bottom of the bed with cardboard and then work my way up, piling branches and plant debris until I’m about half-way up. I actually ran out of debris to fill, so I only filled about one-third of the bed with plant debris and the remaining was filled by top soil and compost. I used the cheapest I could find since I won’t plant in it until next spring. It should give everything a good to decompose over the winter.

Still, it took 20 bags of 1-cubic-foot soil to fill the bed.

Though hard work, getting and filling a new raised bed actually broke the monotony I’ve been feeling lately and made life somewhat excited for a moment. Before then, I constantly felt like I was in a lull, like nothing much was happening. Maybe nothing is better than something.

I haven’t been able to go anywhere on the weekends, not even a trip into the mountains. I think it’s why I’m feeling this way. The only way I can go out on weekends is if she’d come along and she hates nature and the only place she’ll go is the grocery store.

In fact, the only way for me to buy the bagged soil for the raised bed was actually to get it while mom’s not looking. For example, I bought 8 bags of top soil after my orthodontist appointment and got 12 bags of compost at 7 AM yesterday while mom went to the office.

At the moment, part of the backyard is covered in cardboard. I’m attempting to smother the weeds this way as well as amend the soil by letting the cardboard decompose while planting in the fresh new soil on top.

Haha, I think I dream too big sometimes that I might be overestimating things like the size of my backyard.

Right now, I’m dreaming of expanding the garden even further with two more 5-feet by 2-feet beds constructed from 6-inches high cinder blocks but am I thinking too big? Does my backyard even have the space? How will I get the cinder blocks without mom noticing?

I told mom I want to put bricks in the backyard. She didn’t even let me finish before cutting me off, saying that we should go buy it this weekend. I was going to say I wanted bricks to create a walkway between beds. Either way, I don’t exactly want her involved in this project as she has a tendency to take over and I would never get my wish. If it were up to her, my backyard would be covered in red bricks and I don’t want that.

She said she can save me 10% with her military discount but it would mean relinquishing control. Um, I think I’ll rather pay the 10% for full control.