Gardening With No Bending or Kneeling!
I have bad knees, which makes gardening very difficult. Kneeling is totally out of the question, so planting and weeding in the ground is quite miserable for me. I was afraid that I was going to have to give up growing my own veggies when I ran across an idea on the internet that was the answer to my problem. They are called elevated garden beds.
So I drew up some simple plans and I approached my husband with the idea. He thought it was a great idea and proposed that we place four of them down the side of the deck where they would get plenty of sun and would be easy to take care of. Have I mentioned how much I love my husband? :)
Making them is not as easy as it looks, because we made them to last. After putting together the wood shell on legs, we lined the inside with heavy duty pond liner and stapled it to the wood at the top. A two inch PVC pipe with holes drilled in it was laid at the bottom, lengthwise and one end of the pipe extended out the side of the wood shell for drainage. Forty pounds of pea pebble were then poured in to cover the bottom and the pipe. On top of that, we put landscaping screen across the bottom and up the sides and stapled it, to keep the pea pebble clean. Then two forty pound bags of garden soil, and we were good to go. I stained them to match the deck and got ready to plant. I was so excited! See the pictures of our elevated garden beds above.
Having these beds has been a real blessing. Weeding them is a breeze and I can easily examine the plants and harvest my produce. I planted carrots, radishes, Spanish onions, garlic, lettuce, spinach, cauliflower, bell peppers and hot and sweet banana peppers. I have gotten a ton of food from these garden beds, so much I had plenty to freeze and dehydrate, on top of what we have eaten all summer.
Elevated garden beds are the perfect solution for people with problem knees or backs. They are also excellent for the elderly and handicapped, as it allows them easy access and a means to still be able to garden when normally they would not be able to. If you can't build your own, you can buy them on Amazon.com or other gardening websites. They are not overly cheap, but then, they are not cheap to make, it cost us about $150 in materials each. For gardening lovers like me, it is a small price to pay not to have to give up something I love.
Have a great weekend!
Jade :)
Smaller Garden Beds are also available, great for balconies or small yards
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A Blog Hop Adventure
This post is a part of a blog hop that I am doing with a group that I belong to on Facebook: Pinterest Party. Several of us decided to get together and write about Spring Things and we called it the “Pinterest Party Spring Blog Hop”. Why don’t you go see what the others found to write about?
This post is a part of a blog hop that I am doing with a group that I belong to on Facebook: Pinterest Party. Several of us decided to get together and write about Spring Things and we called it the “Pinterest Party Spring Blog Hop”. Why don’t you go see what the others found to write about?
- 3/20 – Paula Atwell from Black Flowers: New Black Flowers for 2015
- 3/21 – Beverly Owens from Indiana Garden: Straw Bale Gardening
- 3/22 – Katy Mitchell from Cousins In The Kitchen: Easy Carrot Side Dish
- 3/23 – Mamta Motiyani Designs by Mamta: Spring Cleaning for Crafters
- 3/24 – Chrisy Gallagher Koesteke Chrisy Is Blogging: Artificial Spring Floral Arrangement
- 3/25 – Kristen Carrasco Kiki(verde) Handmade: Easy DIY Easter Bunny Cake
- 3/26 – Elyn MacInnis The Cheney Kitchen: Vegetable Spaghetti with Pistachio Sauce
- 3/28- Tracey Boyer Homemade by Jade: Elevated Garden Beds
- 3/29 – Amanda Brackney Simple Saving Savvy: Burlap and Ribbon Placemats
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