Garden progress

This week-end was the first long week-end of the Summer here in Canada...and in many parts of the country, it is when you would put your plants in the garden. We have a few weeks to go, here in our Zone 3 climate...with June 1st being our last frost date. So in the meantime...I've been busy getting things going in the greenhouse. This lettuce is almost ready to eat. I debated planting them in a row or in their own peat pots, so I thought I would try both.

I think thinning them to their own pots did get them growing bigger faster...now to transplant them to the garden.

I also started some cabbage and kohlrabi a few weeks ago. These are the survivors...most of them got a little too hot, when I had the heat lamp in the greenhouse.
These are the tomatoes and peppers I started in the window...they are 'sweetie tomatoes' and a variety of peppers...
I am going to buy some romas and some beefsteak tomato plants from our local nursery, because my seedlings had a hard time getting going.

On Mother's Day, we got started on building the raised beds...
The beds are fashioned after the ones described in this book...

since our topsoil is about an inch deep, with clay and rocks below it,I'm hoping this method will be successful. He has lots of information about this method on his website. One of the key elements of this approach is what you fill the beds with...1/3 vermiculite, 1/3 peat moss and 1/3 compost (from a variety of sources). I ordered my vermiculite through Horsefly Hardware...excellent service, by the way...she can order just about anything you can imagine a hardware store to carry and it arrives a week later, no need to drive to town! Hoping to have all of the components ready to go this week-end.