I hope I can have a green thumb this year

A few years ago my wife, Erin, and I got ambitious and decided to have a small garden to grow a few of our favorite fruits and vegetables.

We had limited space and had never grown a garden before, so we had our challenges, but decided to give it a try anyway.

Our ambition lasted about a month since keeping weeds out and watering the crops were more time consuming than either of us imagined. It also didn’t help that of the five or six things we planted only two of them — the tomatoes and cucumbers — produced anything.

This year I have been bitten by the gardening bug again because there is nothing better than the taste of fresh vegetables straight from the garden. I have a better plan of attack this time, although it will be a little more expensive in the beginning.

I am planning on building a couple of raised garden beds and installing an irrigation system. Having the garden lifted off the ground will help prevent weed growth and make harvesting a little easier while the irrigation system will cut down on the time I have to spend watering the plants.

At least that is what the books are telling me. I hope that is the case, because I would love to grow my own vegetables, since some of the veggies I like so much can be expensive at the grocery store — and not nearly as flavorful.

I dream of walking out of my back door to find an abundance of asparagus, green beans and several varieties of tomatoes waiting for me to harvest and cook them.

Of course I would also like to get some blueberries, blackberries and strawberries going. I would also like to plant some cantaloupes for Erin, even though I can’t stand them.

The first step in all of this is deciding how much of each I want and how much space it will take. Then I have to design and build my raised garden beds.

By the time all of this is done, I might not want to do any gardening. The good thing, though, is that those are steps I will not have to repeat next year.

Hopefully the process will be much smoother and enjoyable this year and I won’t run out of ambition midway through the growing season.

I really would like to have a successful garden where my only problem is finding a way to get rid of the excess. Maybe this will be the year that becomes a reality.