The Pain and the Joy (maybe that should be the Joy then the Pain?)!

The landscaping company finally came to grade our lot, which means we can start doing stuff in the yard. My Mr. had built three raised beds awhile back (back when we thought we could start on our yard stuff...) and the landscapers actually filled them with dirt* while they were grading, which was very nice, and saved us a lot of money and time.

Yesterday I planted Amish Paste tomatoes, a cherry tomato (I don't know how that one got in my cart, I didn't mean to buy it), a grape tomato, and one heirloom big slicing tomato that I can't remember the name of at the moment, and 6 beefsteak type tomatoes. I also planted 6 bell pepper plants and 6 anaheim peppers. We're planning on lots of salsa this fall.

Today I planted one long hill with several Kabocha squash seeds (I use to think my favorite squash was acorn, but I think kabocha's are edging them out), corn, beans, peas, two hills of zucchini, and pumpkins. I can hardly wait for things to start sprouting.

You'll notice (or not) that a chunk of the raised bed in the front of the picture isn't planted and doesn't have compost added to it (if you didn't notice, it's not planted and doesn't have compost added to it), you also may notice that the raised beds are HUGE, and way too wide to get at the center without stepping into the garden. It's not ideal, but it was necessary for the chicken coop to be able to fit inside the raised beds- no more dead grass (hopefully) surrounding the chicken coop, since the chickens won't be able (hopefully) to reach the grass from up in the bed. We'll also rotate the coop each year to spread the "fertilizer" around.

All the digging and bending has made my back REALLY sore, but it's a good pain.

*dirt, not soil, because the stuff we have out here is very heavy clay with little to no organic matter. It's going to take a lot of amending to turn it into soil.