Okay, I talked about the tree in my garden last spring and yes, I did get it cut down. Here is all that is left of it. My nephew, who is a metal artist, decided that he wanted to try his hand at wood art. So he worked all summer and created a beautiful bench for me. It is not quite finished, but you can sit on it.
I did a lot of prep work to my beds this year. I also added several more beds. First, I put in all my grass clippings from my yard as well as the leaves left over from the fall. I also added compost, horse manure, some more peat moss, and shredded paper. I dug it all in and then covered it with black plastic to get it working faster. While digging, I did notice there were tons and I mean tons of worms this year. Very good sign!You can see in this picture that I added two more beds. Lucky me, I found one for $5.00 at a garage sale (the dark brown one from Sam's, $39 regular) and then purchased one from Home Depot. I filled them both with compost, dirt, manure, grass clippings, etc. You can also see that I put rocks around the new boundaries of my garden area and killed the grass. I am mulching all of it for ease of keeping it clean. I had some old carpet that I pulled out of my porch room that I cut up and laid under the mulch for more protection from the weeds.
One of the things I miss most about my tiny yard (compared to the 5.3 acres I used to have) are the flowering crab apple trees that I planted all over my property. In the left upper corner, you can see that my neighbor has one and that helps!
