Garden Dreams — Farai Harreld

I’ve been gardening for the past 6 years in our home. I started with a recycled storage tote, filled with soil and kale seeds and a dream. That simple container garden gave me the courage to pursue tearing up a chunk of our backyard and turining into raised beds, and now doing the same with our frontyard.

Lets get my garden woes out of the way.

Ive faced a few challenges that affected my gardening, from pests, to pesticide drift from neighbors , to dealing with invasive plants rom slumlord neighbor landlords not maintaining their yards. My latest gardening woes include some of my favorite perennials- the ones with whom i have a history and kinship, with being decimated by my chickens. I also amended my garden with compost from a local greenhouse that apparently had not reached the proper composting temperatures and therefore was full of grass seeds that absolutely wrecked several of my garden my beds. I was able to keep up with weeding the wayward plants in my first trimester, but once the heat and baby grew, the tall johnson grass won the fight and grew to heights even longer than me. This year I have to remove all the soil from my beds or shut them down with lots of cardboard and mulch in the hopes of killing the ornery grass.

Now on to dreaming

I’ve been drawn to images of potager gardens. I should check to see if my local library has any books on design, but for now our tentative plan is to continue our journey of killing all the lawn in our front yard. Its all currently covered in mulch from a slew of cut down neighborhood trees we asked a local tree cutting company to dump into our driveway. On top of the mulch is a hodgepodge of VEGO garden beds, cedar beds, and a couple brick beds. Its an eyesore, cluttered, and very much full of potential. Im sure my neighbors think we are deplorable, but I have a long term vision that was waylaid by childbirth they are going to have to trust me.

Im dreaming of a wee picket fence surrounding they front for curb appeal but also to keep local wild wayward eastern cottontails and my chickens from nesting in the okra and tomatoes I’m planning on. Along with that, accessible beds in beautiful arrangements full of food, flowers, and herbs. I want an entire bed of calendula, lavender, rosemary, comfrey, and yarrow. I ordered seeds of Zapallo del Tronco Summer Squash, Evertender Okra, and Delicata squash to fill in the beds too. I’m dreaming of buttery crunch lettuces, deep sea green kale, pungent onions, and maybe a wee strawberry bed for little exploring hands. For flowers, borage, cosmos, and zinnias are my staples , but i’d love some flax flower, daisies, and snapdragons too. I dream of fuzzy bees and butterflies reveling between blooms while hummingbirds follow not too far behind them.

I’d like more birdbaths too. Last year we had a family of grackles give birth in the hedge that neighbors our home and it the cherry on top of the cake for the growing season.

What are your garden dreams?