Mary, Mary quite contrary how does your garden grow?
I don’t know! I’ve never had one before!
Sure I’ve rented apartments and houses before. but there is nothing like having a blank canvas to start fresh. And when I mean blank canvas, I mean I get overwhelmed with the endless possibilities of choices!
Mr. G and I were wondering around Home Depot about a month ago looking for pots and plants. He immediately snagged 2 rose bushes (TBD where they were going to go). and I guess I wanted to do a herb trough somewhere.
Can you tell Mr. G is the gardener in the family yet?
We looked at each other and knew we could do it. I quickly calculated the number of bricks needed. I wanted it high like the picture so we grabbed 12 bricks. Mr. G grabbed potting soil (10 bags, geeze do we need that much?!?!).
We finalized where it was going to go – on the end of our patio and I took the measurements for the wood inserts. I had to set the bricks, roughly where they would be placed and measure from cut out to cut out. The bricks also a a center hole. To help strengthen I drove a 24 inch rebar down into the ground as I got the final placement figured out. In the New Mexico dirt, it wasn’t that hard.
Weather turned again and I had to delay finishing up the project, but once it was done, it came out pretty darn good!
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At this point, we filled the bottom third with gravel to ensure we had good drainage. We still needed to add on the top pieces and decide what to plant.
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Then it became even better! Inspired by Pintrest a few years ago (and I never made it till now), I was thinking of building a living wall. We decided to plant Morning Glories. The house we rented in San Diego had them and they made an excellent backdrop for photos and shade.
Mr. G surprised me the other day stringing up twine so the plants have something to climb. I am hoping this will not only be a living wall, but also help keep the patio cooler during the hot summer months.
Below are the latest photos – it’s been 3 or 4 months since we built and planted the Morning Glories. It’s coming out beautiful and we’re learning how to garden in the New Mexico high desert!