Raised Beds

Living and gardening in Memphis, Tennessee, I discovered red clay. It's a very different soil type than the sandy loam in the midwest. When the farmers turn the soil in Illinois, it looks like the inside of a brownie. It will make you drool...
In Memphis, the soil is not so great. I lived in a new construction home where the developers scraped the 8" of native topsoil right off and sold it back to the builders who scattered 2 or 3" around.
If the soil in the midwest is a bag full of helium balloons, the soil in the clay south is like a deck of cards. The bag of balloons is light and the particles bounce around, giving roots the room they need to grow. On the other hand, the deck of cards is on a well waxed wood floor and if you try to walk on them, you slip and fall. The cards are so close together nothing gets between them and they don't have a lot of nutrition in them for your roots.
If you plunge your shovel into the loamy midwest soil, you get some blackish brown earth that crumbles off the shovel.














If you plunge your shovel into the clay, it comes out in a chunk.

you can literally form shapes with it. Not unlike Play Dough.

Not being known for my patience, I quickly decided I needed raised beds. I began collecting random bits of stone and garden edging and I filled in the area with bags of purchased humus. I didn't really have a plan, but it came together pretty well. 

One year, for Christmas, my supportive hubby gave me such a great present:

Complete, with a pitchfork stuck in one of the bags with a red bow on it!! I was thrilled! 

I did not have the time or patience to deal with the red clay that the house was built around. It was almost deadly. It was slimy and smelly and almost anaerobic. I didn't see a worm in the soil for years. But my little rasied bed idea worked great. It wasn't a very deep bed, but the compost, manure and humus did their magic and the nutrients seeped down into the ground below and around. Soon, much sooner than I expected, I had these kind of results:

O gosh. It's been a while since I've seen those. No myrtle or azaleas for me for a long time!!

I don't know that my motives then were all that great, I didn't want to wait and I wanted flowers and veggies. NOW!! 

Um, it says 03/09, but it was really 09/03. I wished I'd taken the photo before the lawn was mowed. 

Very difficult to get a lush lawn in the south in September!!

Sleeping, Creeping.....

This is what the perennial bed looked like last year on this day.
Pitiful.

The raised veggie beds were merely a dream, last year.

This is what the perennial bed looks like, today!!!

The tomatoes became too big for their cages and brought them right down!

A sideways look at the border, taken last month. Notice the iris in the top right? It looks great! How did it die so quickly?? I guess you guys are right and it's borers...What else would cause such quick decline and death???

Even the grass in this year's picture looks better. Jeff re-seeded in the spring with a bluegrass mix that cost us a ton of money. We expect even greater results when the guy aerates the whole thing in September.

I guess you can tell by now that they closed the garden center! It was a great time and I really miss it. I am now back to the drudgery of job hunting. It's quite depressing, although I have gone on fascinating interviews!! I interviewed at the Morton Arboretum for an admin position, but the drive is an hour and a half, and I didn't get it anyways.
I also interviewed with Ball Seed company. You know them, the Wave Petunia people, the Purple Majesty Millet people??? Well, I got the position of breeder technician, which sounds alot more high class than it really is....turns out, it's just a little above minimum wage. And the drive is about 45 minutes. I turned it down.
I will keep looking, though. I won't take any more temp positions. It's too hard when they end...

Transformation

This is the before shot of the house. That sickly yellow lawn full of tall fescue was keeping me up nights, it bothered me so much. Jeff and I have always put a high priority on having, not just a good lawn-the best lawn on the block.

This lawn was only a year old, but it was a juvenile delinquent! It not only wasn't a good lawn, it wasn't fit for pasture! This black topsoil was supposed to top dress the whole project.
It didn't come close.

The excavater found more topsoil and had five of these semi-trucks brought in!

I wish I could get me one of these. This little Bobcat is wonderful and I need it around. I know Kerri's hubby has one, but we paid this guy $100/hour to spread this stuff....

This man was so nice, Jeff had to work that morning, so he helped me carry my brand new beautiful raised beds out to their spots. Then, (can you see the fancy equipment??)
He used his lazar level to get them just right! It took a long time for us to get this far. Right after we got them in place, Jeff came home with burgers and fries!! I am very spoiled by him!

We had a long way to go, after that.
That was Saturday. I spent every hour out there until church on Saturday night. Then, I started the new job on Sunday. On Monday, I did the research and decided which seed I wanted. I knew I wanted bluegrass, but it takes sooo long to germinate. Since we had invested a lot in the soil, I wanted to give it justice, you know? Make it worth it!
So....
I went to the professional turf guys in the little farm town down the road. They install for the major leagues and the parks. I talked at length with them, learned a lot and brought home $600 worth of premium grass seed and fertilizer.
My husband was freaking out when I told him how much I spent.....

But, he recovered and took the next day off of work and rented a power seeder, sometimes called a slit seeder.
***not my husband, not my yard***

Well, the thing broke within an hour. So, he took it back, waited for them to fix it. An hour later, they told him they couldn't fix it. All the while, three days of slow steady rain is coming in from the west. He has to finish before the rain starts!! That seed would really be given a great start if it would rain after it was down!
He ran out to the next biggest town, DeKalb, and rented one there. It took two hours to get it back, and he worked like a crazy man!! To power seed correctly, you go east to west, then diagonally across the whole thing. This machine is a beast to handle, but Jeff made it look like he was mowing the lawn!!

***not my husband, not my lawn***

Just as the first drops began to fall, Jeff finished. It has rained slowly and politely, ever since that evening. All those expensive little seeds are tucked into their expensive blanket now!
We are expecting sunshine and 70's for the next week.
That grass will be so good, it will make me jump for joy!!
***enlarged for texture***