Preparing for a Food Garden

"The Man" is going to build me a few raised beds to plant a food garden in the next couple of weeks. I was hoping to have it done by this weekend because the Natural Gardener has 20% off of soils and bulk mulches through August 31st, but we are also having a garage sale on Saturday and I feel like raised beds on top of everything else going on is asking too much of both of us, besides the fact that it is way too hot still to spend more than an hour outside at time. We are going to pick up a bunch of organic garden soil on Sunday. I will be guesstimating how much we need to buy, at least soil doesn't really go bad. I'll also be limited in how much we buy by what we can load in my Volkswagon golf and how much time we can handle bagging our own in the Natural Gardener's bulk yard.

I was originally hoping for 4 raised beds that were 24inches high, but after pricing cedar at both Lowes and Home Depot it looks like I will be getting only one 24 inch raised bed and one maybe two 12 inch high raised beds, if I am lucky. I think most people right now would be asking about the other dimensions, but I'm not sure if it matters if the beds are 4x4 or 3x5 or any other permutation since we have the room in our backyard and since it all depends on the available wood and cost. I want cedar because it has some natural properties that will make it last longer than making the beds out of other types of wood. It is going to take a minimum of $120 for supplies for one 12 inch raised bed that is 4x4. I had wanted to go with 24 inch height because that gave me the most options over the long run, but I eventually told "the man" that since it is all new anyway I can make do with whatever we can reasonably afford this first go around. I just need to keep reminding myself of that because I get carried away way too easily.

I went to the Natural Gardener's veggie gardening 101 class. I will eventually post my notes. I had no idea that not only would I be buying garden soil for my raised bed, but a regular supply of fertilizer. I could use compost or stuff from my worm bin, but then I would be having to add it almost daily versus every 5 to 6 weeks. I know myself well enough to know that daily and me just don't work well together.

My list of possible veggies to plant in mid-September so far based on what we actually eat on a weekly basis.
Cabbage
Kale
Collards
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Brussel Sprouts
Mustard Greens
Sugar Snap Peas
Spinach

Most of these are in the same family which makes me wonder how I am going to follow the recommendation of rotating veggies in the same family to a different bed each year so that my soil can stay in good shape since different families use different nutrients. I now know why I had such a problem growing anything but cilantro and snow peas in the community garden plot I managed for the Americorps program I was a part of in the late '90s. I didn't do any research back then, I just planted stuff and hoped it would grow. Who knew that gardening had so much involved in it. Okay, gardening where you actually want to harvest stuff.