Every year I try to get really fancy while planning my garden – with grid paper, colored pencils, markers, etc. I beautifully begin to sketch out my two front beds, 1 back bed, and miscellaneous planters to visualize based on heights how it will all look like. Here’s how it turns out….
Beautiful Sketch….
The problem is, that’s how far I get….Every year I get through about ¼ of it – then I get bored so I just scribble in the rest of the plants I want to include in the un-beautified square feet that are left. Here’s an example of what I’m typically left with…
Finished Product….
On top of that – I don’t keep good track of the numbers. I plant way too many seedlings of everything and then I feel guilty if I don’t plant them so I pawn them off on neighbors and friends. I con them into believing that they’ll have fresh produce all summer in their 2 square feet of city porch and then coerce them into spending hundreds of dollars on planting materials. This year, things are going to be different!
I signed up for SmartGardener last year – the sign up is free and you can do it here. There are small up charges for additional packages. For example, I utilize square foot gardening so I had to upgrade to the right template but it’s TOTALLY WORTH IT. I also bought a harvest calculator this year – I’ll let you know if I actually take the time to update it when I harvest. Here’s the planned front yard garden…
Yup – I’m pretty ambitious huh? The best part for me isn’t just for planning the layout – it’s planning how many of each plant I need when I’m trying to start seedlings. You see, as much as I love coercing my friends into taking my left over seedlings, it’s been 2 years, and they’ve caught on.
For each plant, you can click and see this….Not only how many to plant per square foot BUT how many to plant TOTAL! LET THE SEED STARTING BEGIN!
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