Working with what you've got

We've been in our new house since June.  We've been trying to take a wait and see approach to re-vamping the entire garden.  We wanted to see the yard in all it's seasons before making any major decisions.  (that and our limited budget).  Ironically, our back yard with it's 3  Koi ponds and 29 palms turned out to be not so awesome in terms of growing veggies being on a northern slope.  Other than that it is a paradise.

So with my desperate need for fresh herbs and veggies we looked around.  And discovered that our cement covered front yard had southern exposure.  Hmmmm. 

David being the perfectionist and asthetic had ideas of tearing up cement.  Um not even close to on our budget  I suggested building raised planters.  David agreed that could work, but we would need redwood since other woods would rot.  Again not on our budget (are you seeing a theme here?)   Perhaps next year once we recover from putting on a new roof.  But we did have some Doug fir (which would rot). 

Well in a stroke of genius (or bad taste if you ask David)  I remembered seeing plantings in old bathtubs and such and thought well heck I can buy plastic storage containers from Home depot for $4 a piece drill a hole in the bottom.  So David built a platform for the containers so they would get more sun over the fence.  And here they are.  I planted basil parsley, thyme and chives and have plans for another for tomatoes and cukes.

This is not a permanent solution.  But planting time is afoot and heck even fresh sprouts in plastic bins is an improvement over pavement in my mind.  Perhaps we can afford redwood next year.

Perhaps not to the aesthetic's eye a perfect solution but for those of us on a budget.  Hey if you have a deck you can have a garden.