We moved into our new home last Summer and by the time the dust settled on some issues that came with the new house, we were not able to put work in on our garden. This Spring we decided we needed the garden to happen this year. We are excited.
In early March my wife and I started our seedlings inside our house and they were growing like crazy, much faster than we anticipated. We knew we wanted to do raised beds for a few reasons, but we didn’t know how we wanted them setup. We started looking online at different types of raised gardens. Some were elevated off the ground, and others that were more simple and setup on the ground, but still raised. We finally decided that we would start things this year with two 6′ x 3′ rectangular boxes and would see how they work for this year.

We already have two much smaller raised planters that we started at our townhouse and worked really well, and would dedicate those to herbs.
Once we were ready to get building we pulled the trigger on the lumber for the beds and built them the first nice weekend we had time. The design was basic 4 sided boxes made with 2x10s and 4x4s lagged together and set onto the ground.

We were excited to get things going, but hit a snag when we shifted gears to the tree removal in our back yard. We were not planning on having the trees removed this year, but that is explained in another post. The location we decided on putting the beds is directly above the root system for one of Maple Trees that was previously in the yard. When we decided to get the trees and roots removed, we obviously could not fill the beds with soil as they would have to be moved to get to the roots for removal.

Now that the trees have been removed, our beds are finally ready for prime time! Over this past weekend my wife was extremely excited and on Friday night we went out to the home improvement store and got 18 bags of soil to be ready to add to the beds. On Saturday morning, bright and early, she was already migrating everything from their starter beds and planters and into their new homes.

I am looking forward to seeing how things work out with the beds and to see what we can yield this year.
