From Milan

I feel at home in Milan. It is the only large City besides Toronto where this occurs.
Massimo is working here until the end of June so I came up to visit for his birthday and I will stick around for a week or so.
There was so much happening to my Crops that it was hard to leave.
I can hardly imagine what it will look like in a week with all the growing and bearing and blooming that is going on right now!

While I'm here I hope to post a story or two.
The first is the before and after of the Crops in a Castle entrance.

Before

What we had to face:
- the columns had partially collapsed
- there was a very high step between the outside and the inside
- this is the shadiest part of the garden but the space for plants was not delimited
- the gate was to be replaced

That is a lot for one person in one weekend so we spread it out into many tiny and pleasant weekend projects that may give you inspiration also.

The Columns




The Steps




The Gate Massimo made and the Flowerbeds





That's me covered with cement and content in the pictures above.
The sense of accomplishment actually building something permanent conveys makes you radiant inside and it shows on the outside too.
I have always taken tasks very seriously but none have given me the happiness these sturdy results of my efforts have granted me with.

Now I'm off to see a movie in the City!
See you on the next post.

before and after: The raised bed area

It is raining out today. A light but perseverent mist that is bathing all the vegetables and flowers that are enjoying it as much as I enjoyed the sprinkler as a child on a hot summer day in the city.
It is the perfect day to fish a "before and after" story out of the photo tank on my desktop.
It was hard to choose one out of so many but the most rewarding project was the one that now produces Food! And it is also the project everyone chipped in on! So here it goes.

Crops in a Castle..... because our tiny orchard stands where the Castle of Foce once stood.
It was a slopey and sloppy piece of land full, and I mean full of rocks. BIG ONES.
Among many challenges, levelling off the land, was probably the most blistering experience of my life.
Here is one example. The raised bed area as it once was and now is:

This is what happened in between:
Step one. DIG - DIG - DIG
Step two. Get all the weeds out of the land.
Step three. Drag away all the extra earth
Step four. Level it out with a rake and heaps of patience.

At that point it began to look like this:
Wow, there was a wall back there!

Yes I agree, it looks even more discomforting.
But it looks prettier with Patsy Baby (Mom) and Papà smiling at you.

I realized at this point that the level was really high compared to the main part of the garden so I decided to split it two separate levels.

Levels need steps and walls to contain the earth. Get creative and recycle.

First two steps are made with wood beams from an old building: Recycled.

They weren't enough so I built the missing step with some left over bricks and cement: Recycled
Then I needed one step for access to the second level. Mom suggested some concrete rectangular garden containers she no longer used and small step in the centre. It worked perfectly.

Massimo then made the raised beds. God bless his hands.

TIP: make the beds on the premises, they are way too heavy to carry after! We made that mistake and it still hurts to even think about it.
TIP: if you are levelling out land don't throw out the extra earth. Sieve it and you'll see it will come in handy sooner or later. All the earth I removed from this area was used to fill the raised beds.
TIP: The perfect width for a raised bed is double the length from your wrist to your armpit. Our arms are all very different. Make then to fit your size perfectly and you won't regret it.

Here is the finished view from above

.

Mind you, it took two weeks to level the land and another two for the steps.
A week end for the raised bed, another week end to fill them.
But there is now endless time in the future to plant crops and enjoy this part of the garden.

before and after

Last year I spent almost all my time landscaping.
Landscaping sounds very chic but the truth is there was sweat, dirt and heat; backbreaking digging, lifting stones and mixing cement.
But I suddenly realized I am hooked. I can't stop. It is my favourite gym for body and soul. So yesterday I took a quick look at an unexplored area of the orchard and decided to make it level, rational, clean and pretty.
If you don't know what to do to improve your garden just sit there and stare and listen and stare and listen. Believe me, it will talk to you. It will tell you what to do. You will suddenly visualize. There is no other explanation on how I managed to landscape.

Let it talk to you, you will love it. Look at what this part of the garden told me:

We now have...
- a big white sitting stone
- a new raised bed made with left over "tegole", italian roofing tiles
- a small circular garden bed at ground level
- tidy paths to reach the compost bins and my potato pen

And while I was working the big white rock spoke to me and asked me for some company. I turned and caught a glimpse of some sad rocks my mother had collected years ago at Lago di Garda. They are now smiling at the big white rock from under the plum tree behind the white tulips and fava bean plants.

Here is another view of my new landscaping project before and after.