By Nida Angeliadis
I love making new plans for my garden and winter is the perfect time—especially if the changes are a little more involved—because it gives me more time to think them through. I moved to my property about two and a half years ago and it was quite neglected and empty, so my backyard is an empty canvas and I’m eager to fill it with projects. I have three main projects that I want to address this spring—building a greenhouse, adding raised beds, and turning part of my front yard into a flower field.
I recently finished a renovation that left me with 10 old windows, and I decided I would use them to build a greenhouse. Some of the windows are in pretty bad shape, while others look quite good. I plan to prime and paint all of the windows during the winter. Many have broken glass panes that need replacing. All of the window panes need reglazing, which I spent a good amount of time researching online. Although many people that I spoke to seemed to think glazing windows was a very difficult task, I’ve found it relatively simple, although requiring patience and a long drying time.
This picture is the closest I could find to the 8’X10’ structure I plan to build. ( I can only hope mine comes out as nice!) I want all of the walls to be shingled from the bottom up to about 3’ height. Then I’ll put my windows on top of that frame. The roof would be an A frame covered in corrugated clear plastic and, of course, there would be a front door.I plan to add some raised beds right next to the greenhouse once it’s finished. I used to have raised beds made with cedar, but this time I want to use cement blocks. I like the ease and speed with which they can be created and I plan to sheet mulch inside the beds once the blocks are in place.
Lastly, I have a small section of grass in my front side yard that I'll convert to wild flowers. During construction, a portion of this lawn was trampled to mud. I took the opportunity to plant wild flowers in the mud instead of reseeding the lawn, and it was quite successful. I had some lupines, brown-eyed Susans, clover, butterfly weed, and other flowers growing. The remainder of this part of the lawn is grass, so I decided that instead of trying to remove it somehow, which would be a lot of work, I’ll just cover it in clear thick plastic in the spring and allow the sun to do the work of killing off the grass. I also like this method because it does not involve the use of any chemicals. This way, after a month or so, I plan to remove the plastic and scatter more wild flower seeds!
Nida Angeliadis is a member of GCW and is also a garden alchemist.
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