Time has taken on a new sense these days. Working from home has warped my sense of time, and yet has leant itself to accomplishing so many things in the yard in what is actually a fairly short amount of time. I feel like we have accomplished as much in the last 3 months that we usually accomplish in all of summer. That’s a major positive of this unique time we find ourselves in

I was pleasantly surprised when flipping through my photos this morning, to see how much our plants have grown in 30 days. I guess when you see them every day, the progress doesn’t seem as much. When working at the office, I didn’t always get out into the back every day, so the changes were more noticeable. Here are some of the updates.

Our progress on the walls in the last 3 weeks has been substantial. We have cemented posts in, packed the crushed gravel bases, run landscaping fabric & wire and have filled one of the three walls with rocks. For perspective, we only successfully finished one wall last year. In a months time we should have 3 built and filled.

We love brussel sprouts and decided that even though we don’t have enough space developed, we really wanted to try growing this veggie. So we cleaned out the compost, turned the soil and voila! A new garden bed for some more plants. They are growing great and love the spot we have put them in.

Our potatoes are growing like weeds, which is fantastic since I thought that I may have to restart them. I tried a new seed potato this year and the eyes weren’t as long or established as past years seed potatoes. Luckily, with all the rain and warmer temperatures, they are now growing quickly! We need to purchase some more straw soon as another level is going to have to be added. We have topped up with some soil but I like to have a 60/40 soil/straw mix. We find that using some straw helps create spaces for the potatoes to grow big.

To be honest, we thought our cherry tree was likely dead. Half of it died last summer for some reason, with a lot of sap in the joints of the branches to the trunk, but we couldn’t figure out what happened. We left the tree in the fall, expecting to likely be taking it out this last spring…but the half that didn’t die is actually doing great! Hopefully we can beat the birds to the few cherries the tree has produced.

The carrots are coming along great and so far Basil has shown no interest to her favourite garden treat. Just to be safe, we did build a fence around the bed to ensure our little thief does not make away with the goods before we can enjoy.

Our flowers are really coming along. These are what surprised me the most as I felt they hadn’t grown much. It turned out them have actually grown quite a bit. Next year I will likely start with more flowers in our large planters out front. They are coming along nicely, with the clematis starting to fill out. Once the sun hits and sticks around for a while, those planters will fill quickly with the spreading flowers inside. Our back barrels are coming along nicely.

The zucchini hasn’t grown much, but it is looking healthy and strong, just waiting for some hot weather to explode with growth.

The butternut squash is about the same, healthy, but waiting patiently for some good heat to kick its growth into high gear.

The cucumber is good, but in need of some weeding, as you can clearly see from the photos above. We lost two of them so we plunked some new seeds into the ground and they have pushed up and are growing quickly.

Our onions are out of control! They are growing so fast, which is great. I don’t think we will run out of green onion this summer. The pepper plants that are in the same bed are happy but waiting for some heat to really start making some movement upward.

Our accidental driveway strawberries are thriving. With all the rain we have had, they have been busy sending runners, growing berries and thickening up. I have eaten quite a few of these wild strawberries that pop in your mouth like candy. Lucky for me, K doesn’t really like them and prefers our other strawberries.

Although not all our levels of strawberries came back, the ones that did are producing! Another week, maybe less and we will have a nice little harvest. We are looking forward to a few runners that we can transplant to the top level.

My herb planter is doing great, with some new herbs popping up. I decided not to put in dividing wood and am instead, going to let it all grow together, perhaps a little wildly.

Last, but certainly not least, my watermelon. Another new plant for me to try growing. It’s healthy, but isn’t growing as much as I would have liked. A little bit of hot weather should have them growing quickly.

That’s it, that’s all, for now. The next post will likely be an update on the finished walls. We only have two left to fill, so we are already halfway done!