When Dee and I first lived in Ames, her twin sister and family allowed us to have a garden in their backyard. We then moved to Mason City and the garden returned to “yard”. I loved growing fruits and vegetables in that garden. That little 10’x20′ patch gave a lot of funny stories, including one where Chris ate one of my Habenero Peppers and nearly killed himself. I had peppers, tomatoes, corn, watermelon, beans, peas, cucumbers, you name it. Now I have nothing.
I grew up being dragged to our garden and was tasked with gardening and picking and prepping.. quite frankly I hated it. So now you ask, why am I designing a garden table that I can grow fruits and veggies in? Well, first off, it is MY idea ( or at least Dee and my idea). With vegetables and herbs costing so much money being able to grow my own is very tempting and really quite exciting.
Dee and I have always talked about wanting a garden but since we rent we can’t dig up the back yard. So we just let the idea pass and never acted on it. With our recent trip to Italy Dee and I learned (and experienced) the importance of fresh ingredients in our cooking. Since we both fancy ourselves culinary experimenters we need fresh items for our cooking. HENCE…. the GARDEN!
So, Dee and I started exploring container gardening and I stumbled upon a lady who uses a raised garden bed, but it is not a traditional raised bed that is still on the ground, but instead is elevated. I decided that this is something that I could tackle. I would not consider myself terribly “handy” but I can get by with a few power tools and instructions. Except with this project there are no instructions, so I needed to design them myself. I enjoy drawing and modeling and have sine I was young. I remember designing sneakers, buildings, rockets, and even a kite or two. So I jumped into this project and started doodling (to scale and with a ruler mind you!). I hope to draw up the plans in a CAD program or drafting program later today but I am really partial to pencil and paper when it comes to designing and diagramming projects. I know most of you are surprised by that.
Now, since so many people have asked about this project on Twitter and Facebook I decided to chronicle it on my blog here. I will post pictures and final draft ideas here. I am going to use my Flikr feed for this since I need a refresh on using it.