Starting a Garden!

       So, similar to many teens, I love plants. I have many in my room, around the house, and have a hydroponic garden in my family room. We have a nice flower garden in our backyard, but because my amazing mother has a black thumb, we've never really been able to do much with it. This year for 4H I decided that I wanted to start a garden in raised beds. After doing some research my dad thought he was going to be able to build me beds. I was telling my grandpa, who has an amazing green thumb, all about my plan, then HE GOT ME SOME RAISED BEDS!

       I've been keeping some starts on music stands in front of windows in my house, and just the other day I filled my boxes! I put compost, moist soil on the bottom of the beds, then some fertile black dirt on the top. After, I fully saturated the dirt, and let it sit overnight. Then I got up the next morning and saturated them again. I waited about two days after, for the boxes to fully settle and dry. If you can squeeze the dirt and make a mud ball it's still too wet, but if the dirt crumbles from your hand, it's time to plant.

       So flash forward a couple days and I PLANTED!!! I planted lettuce, cabbage, radishes, sweet onions, and broccoli in one raised bed. Then I planted, sweet peppers, basil, parsley, thyme, lemon thyme, potatoes, and peas in another! My grandpa, aka gardener extraordinaire, came up and helped me get it started! It all looked so nice and, if I'm being completely honest, it wasn't that hard of a process. The next couple of days it rained so I didn't really have to worry about making sure they had enough initial water.

        From today, It has now been a week since I planted (if you want to see videos of my process check out my tik tok @sophieschneblin)! My pea starts have been doing great!!! PLUS I have starts of radishes popping up!!! I did have some initial wilt in my cabbage and basil, primarily, but my papa did tell me that was going to happen so I have faith that they're going to come back strong! This process has been so exciting so far, and I can honestly say that I can't wait until everything is ready to harvest! I am so excited to take you guys on this journey with me. Please, please, please let me know in the comments if you guys like to see this kind of unconventional stuff on here, and what else you would like to see! I have a ton of ideas if you want to see them!