Steps on sprucing up your garden

If you got excited about your garden and got busy working only to see your efforts fail, you are not alone. Your story is actually shared by more than a few gardeners the world over. Let's review the usual sequence in this all too familiar story, shall we? First, you got excited about the idea of gardening.

Maybe you took an inspiring trip which gave you an urge to reconnect with Mother Nature. Alternatively, maybe in the middle of paying through the nose for some organic vegetables at your local farmers' market it dawned on you that maybe you can grow those vegetables you're buying. Regardless, a spart was lit and it felt that there was no turning back.

You built or bought beds, acquired some good potting soil, put down seeds, and hydrated your beds. Things moved on and you felt great. Your friends and family eventually got used to your Facebook updates of your beds in different stages of growth. Suddenly, the seasons changed and the rest of your life caught up with you. Schedules got tight and your garden kind of fell between the cracks of your scheduler.

You stopped checking on your garden. Weeds appeared. Things stopped being fun at the garden. The spark has flickered out by this time. You found other things to occupy your weekends. By this point, your garden looks like yet another personal that fell by the wayside. You have two options at this point, you can devote two hours to recovering that excitement you originally had or you can opt to keep your project idle but at least save some face doing so.

Here is how you do it
Invest two hours this weekend to totally clear out the weeds from your garden. Within the first fifteen minutes, you'll quickly find out if the spark has come back as you enjoy the manual labor and the fresh air. If not, keep reading below for your next alternative. If after 15 minutes, things aren't picking up and you feel that things are taking too long, you toss some cover crop overwinter seeds over your field. This should buy you time until spring to decide what to do with your garden. If after 15 minutes, you are energized and want to garden again, add a layer of compost to your field and plant your fall crops. Using these alternatives, either way you're feeling, you have it covered.