A raised flower bed with plants and flowers planted.

Raised Garden

Ever since I married my husband, I’ve wanted to build a raised garden. I used to love spending time in my grandparents’ garden, and to this day, I love the smell of certain veggies because it reminds me of so many happy memories with them. I seemed to always have an excuse, housework needed to be done, or meals needed to be made for the kids while my husband worked in the yard. I used to put my housework off until the weekends a lot because, on Sunday afternoon, I could catch up after church. COVID-19 hit, and things changed. My workload seemed to increase as far as actually anchoring and reporting and hours,  but my community service and emceeing schedule went down in terms of going to other places on the weekend because the virus forced so many events to cancel. For me, that has been, in a way, a blessing in the sense that it’s allowed me to do things I’ve wanted to do but just kept putting on the back burner.  Long story short, hubby and I had just had breakfast one Sunday morning, and he asked me if I still wanted a veggie garden. I was so excited he brought it up because the answer was still yes. We ended up in Lowes mask and all.

PIcture of the back of a truck with bags of soil and wood boards in truckbed.

I love watching my husband’s mind work. It functions differently than mine in many ways, and I absolutely treasure it in moments like these…  He was doing calculations in his head quickly decided what pieces of wood we needed while asking me questions he knew my right brain would grasp. He then looked at me and told me exactly how much soil to get and to meet him on the other end of the store. I’m not going to lie, I love seeing him in this mode, and the two of us focused on an end goal for our family. We were perfectly out of sync and somehow dancing to the same tune.   Even now, thinking of it as I write this knowing it’s a memory I will cherish for years to come. Anyway, I digress; I was thinking about what I wanted in my salsa garden and how to space the plants and companion flowers and herbs.

Picture of boards being arranged on concrete to create a small raised flower bed.

He was thinking in terms of square footage, types of wood, bolts, and making me smile. We got the truck loaded and headed home. He pulled out saws, and I move the dirt to the backyard along with the plants.

He used the weedeater to clear the space, we raked it out, and then we put the frame in place. I know there are different ways to do this, but this time we just lined the bottom with cardboard and added the dirt.  Soon we had the plants in place and were picking up our tools and cleaning out the garage.

Picture of raised flower bed on a lawn with plants and flowers planted in the flower bed.

I’ve not had a raised garden before, so this will be a learning experience as we see what works and what doesn’t, but no matter what happens, this was such a fun day, and I’m so thankful we were able to get this much of the job done.