The Veggie Garden - Update

as bought

Although it has been a prodigious first year for the veggie garden, the spring/summer crops had begun to fade into oblivion (plus, who needs that much eggplant when most of your neighbors hate eggplant?).  So, last weekend I dug out all the fading/non productive stuff and tilled up the beds for replanting with FALL and WINTER veggies!!  I know, I know, it's still 100 degrees and yadda yadda, but seriously, I am jonesing for fall and reviving the veggie garden will help save my sanity. Which is in precious need of saving due to the amount of work I've put in this summer in my *cough* corporate (ugh) job...... Thank goodness for chickens and cherry tomatoes.

prepping the space

 So far the following have been torn out (either because they were unproductive or I was just sick of eating nothing but eggplant for 3 months straight) - eggplant (one lone shrub survived the purge - you are welcome Pat); radishes (fungus and wilt problems lately); cantaloupe (only 1 plant survived), carrots and corn (damn you rodents!).  And now the following are getting an early start on fall......  Spinach, arugula, yellow onions, broccoli, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, more curled parsley (because I like it in my omelettes), and w more thornless blackberries (because, yum.).  These join the standards that made the cut to stay which include - green beans, orange and green bell peppers, fresno chilies, basil, honeydew, cherry tomatoes, raspberries, blueberries, grape tomatoes, old german heirloom tomatoes, pineapple tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries, asparagus and the necatarine and lime trees.

as of today, scraggly

cucmbers

hot hot chilies

beans

previously eggplant, now spinach starts

Lets face it, these girls get more of the goods than I do. Ingrates.

Courtyard drainage.....

So half my front yard is absolutely gorgeous. Low water, no mowing, minimal weeding and blooming away like a champ. The OTHER half has been, well........ bleh.

Granted, the torn up driveway doesn't help, but my biggest issue has been trying to solve a drainage issue stemming from the first incompetent contractor who worked on the courtyard and poured the slab 4 inches lower than planned. Thus, the drainage for the courtyard is a little outlet that was just below level with the yard. doh.

SO. The long stretch of wall visible above at the right side presented some issues. How to incorporate drainage without it looking like a giant drainage ditch. oh good,  a puzzle.

First we re-route some of the courtyard plumbing....

Then we start building concrete molds for curbing.....

The general idea was to try and make the drainage look like a dry desert wash or creek bed to fit in with my general garden theme from the other side of the yard. How it turns out.... still unknown.

I did discover that it is not easy for one person to do concrete work solo. I mixed the first section myself... pressed some river rock into the top as it set....

 
and then I wised up and asked my neighbors for help with the second and third sections....  This allowed me to finish the back curb and start planting some succulents in the dirt strip along the courtyard wall. To soften the edge and because I like succulents. alot.

I still have one more section of curb to pour and then gravel and cobble to place. Should be able to finish it up by the weekend.

Top of the drainage. Run-off from the courtyard comes out a small hole at the top right of the gravel section.

The First Ten Months - Exterior

And what, you might wonder, does an overambitious, type A single woman decide to do first? Something nice and safe and tame like painting a room? or knocking down all the cobwebs?  NAAAHHHH. Let's make a list of "shit I feel like doing to the house".....

1.) New Roof - I don't know why, but I've always seen this house as a Mediterranean beauty with a large front courtyard and a water-wise California front garden.

After ripping Two different roofs off.....

 

New Tile Roof? Hells Yes.

Now we're getting somewhere.....

2.) New Exterior Paint - Peachy beige is not working for me. Maybe something is a bright cream color?

I live in this room more than the living room...

3.) A big, livable front courtyard with raised beds.......

 4.) Start getting rid of that water-sucking green lawn (I live in an irrigated desert, ya know). Alright, I admittedly only got half done before I burned out (and nearly threw out my back shoveling out lawn and shoveling in DG.

 One side of lawn out out, One side of garden bliss in...

And now, for my next act..... the biohazard suit - worthy interior........