One of my very favorite things is sharing my garden with other people. I love seeing other gardens as well. It always inspires me to see various garden designs or possibly learn about a new variety of something I might like to plant in the future. That’s the main purpose for this article: To share my garden and give you space to share yours as well!
Below you can see just how our garden has evolved over the years. Check out the Before and After photo to see where I started in 2019 with 3 little beds to what my Main Garden looks like in 2023.
As you can see here, I started with 3 simple beds in 2019. I got this wood completely for free by asking my dad if he had any scrap wood I could have. I took what he had and made these 3 boxes which I still use today.
I might’ve spent $20 that first year in 2019, to get these 3 beds going.
Our Previous Garden
I should mention this was not my first experience with a vegetable garden. I had actually grown vegetables in the past but after my divorce in 2012, I was just working far too many hours while juggling my 4 boys and my career. My love of growing my own food got put on hold for many, many years.
June 2011 – He was only 5
Yep, I had it in storage all that time.
A Fresh Start
We bought our current home in 2013 but I was completely focused on raising my kids and building my career. I do find it kind of funny that God repositioned me in 2019 to finally start a VERY small little veggie patch just a year before the pandemic came and changed my life around.
One year later I found myself with a ton of free time on my hands as our chamber staff had to cut our hours to only 10 a week, in order to save the budget during the pandemic. (more about that story another time) So in 2020, I got busy collecting a lot more free wood. I had also started composting and completely FELL IN LOVE with creating my own garden soil!
Here you can see how I had started expanding the garden in 2020. I was building a few more beds with free wood and utilizing lots of pots that were given to me or that I found on freebie sites on Facebook.
By the spring of 2020, I was already starting to envision new beds along the fence line. Ironically, I discovered that $1.98 fence posts from Lowes actually made a pretty decent garden bed!
You might notice some of those fence posts above had to be replaced. Yes, the neighbor dogs really liked to antagonize Rocky whenever we were outside. I had to replace a few of those fence posts. That’s when I discovered, “Hey, these are only $1.98 and they’re 6′ long?” So I grabbed 5 extra posts and made myself a 12′ x 2′ bed along the fence line. It worked so well, I went back a week later and bought 5 more. At that point I had spent only $20 and added another 48 sq ft of garden space. I was also composting EVERYTHING so that I could fill up new beds with compost and not have to spend any more money. Remember, I was a single momma on a budget!
I got some more free wood from my dad and from Facebook, so I made several small beds along the fence line.
You CAN Start A Garden With Very Little Money
It amazes me to look back at these photos and realize how far we have come. If you have a desire to grow your own food, I promise you can do it! I will show you how. I had NO extra money as a single mom drowning in debt. And I certainly didn’t think my tiny back yard was big enough to become what it is today! I can’t wait to show you how it was possible.
(nearly same view)
We are working on some videos to show you exactly how the garden changed and evolved over the past 5 years. I also plan to do a video detailing what we would have done differently. Hopefully you can learn from some of our mistakes! We have made plenty along the way.
Thank you so much for being here. If you want to see more from our garden transformation, please subscribe to our YouTube Channel so you don’t miss the videos once they are released.
Please comment below to tell us about your garden dreams.
Remember to go the Second Mile for someone today. Have a blessed day Friends!
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