Welcome to the Weekend Coffee Share. How is your week? I’d say that I’ve had a great week so far. I worked three days, had school one day, and three days off. We still have freezing nights most nights, but the day temperature is slowly getting higher. When I rode my bike up to the garden this morning it was still cold 28F/-2C. Later in the day we enjoyed sunshine and 48F/9C. It was wonderful.

This was what my garden looked like when I arrived this morning. I had a great task at hand, it was time to install the deer fencing. Without it I don’t get to eat anything I grow. I take it down every fall, and put it up again in the spring. I do this for two reasons: I don’t want any animal to get stuck in it during the winter when no one is around, and I also figure it lasts longer if the fence doesn’t have to deal with the weight of the snow every year.

It’s a rather flimsy netting in my opinion, since I am used to horse fencing, but this is the one the garden society recommend that we all use. I purchased mine three years ago and it is still in good condition.

This year I cut the netting into six sections and when installing them I made it in a way so that it is easy to take one section down at a time to trim the surrounding grass. I used to have only two huge pieces of netting for my whole garden, and then let it sit the whole season, just trimming around the netting. This year I want to try to keep things a little neater. No one complained so far, but I’d like to try to do a little better.

It felt so great when it was done! I have crops that are ready to go in the ground, and I also want to start direct sowing the first seeds (carrots, beets, poppies, marigolds).

Ever since I made the Hügelkultur bed (the longest bed in the photo above), I’ve struggled with the edges falling apart every year, with soil going everywhere. This year I figure I would plant perennials along the edges that help me keep the bed together. I have suitable perennials (Geranium macrorrhizum, Stachys byzantina) in other parts of my garden that I planned to move there. I told my gardening neighbour about my plans and she said that it would probably work but if I wanted to I could have som Geranium macrorrhizum from her that she wanted to give away, that way I wouldn’t have to move mine. I graciously accepted.

While moving the plants from her garden to mine she asked if I also wanted some Bistorta affinis. How could I not accept that? Said and done, now my bed has plenty of perennials on the edges and hopefully it will both look beautiful and help keep the bed together.

Before leaving for the day my friend and I had coffee together in the sun.

Like I said it the beginning, this whole week has been a good week, but today was probably the best day of them all. Now it’s your turn to tell me about your week!

Thank you Natalie for hosting the Weekend Coffee Share!

Maria