One Hundred Dollars a Month

It’s that time again. You ask, and I pretend to know things and answer your burning questions. It really is so much fun to open my inbox and see the wide variety of questions you guys have. Reminds me that my readers are so diverse and pretty dang awesome. So keep those questions coming and I’ll keep racking my brain for answers. As always, please pipe up if you have any input or are knowledgeable when it comes to any of the following questions:

Hi Mavis,
Long time follower here. I’ve always dreamed of having a huge garden. I’ve been putt ting it off until “I get the perfect house with the perfect yard” well this year we moved and decided to rent until we found our “forever home”.

I decided to rent some community garden plots because I really want to grow our own food. Do you have any recommendations on how to proceed? I went by the garden site the other day and found that my garden beds are full of rotten plants and potatoes (from the previous garden). Should I just mix them in and hope that it fertilizes or should I try to empty all the dirt out of the current raised beds?

~Rebekah

This is a great question Rebekah! When you say rotten plants… do you mean diseased or just decaying plants? If the beds are small and easily accessible and you are working with diseased plants I would totally empty as much of the dirt out as possible and start with a new batch of garden soil with a good compost mixed in.

If this is a giant garden plot, I would probably pull up as much stuff as you can but know that you’ll probably still have a few potato plants popping up in random spots {finding all those tiny seed potatoes that were left behind can be hard}.  I wrote a post titled 7 Tips for Improving the Garden Soil in Your Raised Garden Beds a few years ago that might be helpful. But if there is one thing that I’ve learned over the years, is that even if you are working with junky soil… if you can add in enough GOOD soil and compost… chances are you’ll be able to turn the growing conditions of your garden plot around real quick.

I randomly found your website while looking into gardening. I live in Vancouver, WA near Portland, OR. I loved your garden!. We have a smaller one; we use stock tanks and I just got my little greenhouse. I am learning how to grow veggies in the greenhouse. Since you are in my area do you have a post on when and what you plant in your greenhouse and when? Thanks in advance!! 

~Angelia

Oh Angelia, I do so miss the greenhouse we had at our old house and I am counting down the days until I can get one installed in my new garden. It will be this year, but I am hoping to have one by Spring of 2019. I looked through all my old greenhouse gardening posts and I was shocked that I wasn’t able to find a post specifically about tips for growing vegetables in a greenhouse. Which is really, really strange because it seems like I grew or at least started seeds in our last one.

So, mark my words… I’ll work on one. But if you’d like to take a look at some of my old greenhouse posts, you can find them here.

Hi Mavis! I too am getting our home ready to put on the market and need to do a lot of painting. Since it seems like you paint something almost every week, how do you keep your house from constantly smelling like paint fumes.

~Christina

Ha! Yes Christina I DO LOVE TO PAINT! 😉 And I have one simple {and free} tip for you. Ventilation Ventilation Ventilation. On days that I am painting, I start as early in the morning as possible, turn the thermostat down, and then open all the windows and screen doors and keep them open for several hours after I am done painting. Keeping the windows and doors open as long as possible as well as running a couple of fans to move the air around should get your rooms aired out quickly.

Some people suggest cutting an onion in half and placing it in the freshly painted room so it will help absorb the orders… But really, you need to open the windows.  And when it’s bedrooms that I am painting, I always wait 48 hours after painting before sleeping in the room so nobody ends up with a headache.

One last tip is to make sure you are not leaving open cans of paint in the room while you are painting. Seems simply I know, but keeping your can of paint in the garage or outside while you paint indoors will help cut down on the fumes tremendously.

How is Lucy adjusting to all this change? I moved our furniture to the garage to re-carpet the living , dining and family room. Out cats went crazy. Their special sleep spots were gone. Took a week for them to settle back down after putting back the furniture.

~Gayle

For the most part, Lulu is doing well. The first night was a little rough as every single sound put her on high alert but she is doing much better now. Because this is such a new space for her though, we have ZERO plans to leave her home alone. Which means more car rides, time in her car seat and adventures for Lucy! Which of course she is over the moon about. 😉

Have a question for me? Submit them HERE and I’ll try to answer them.
~Mavis