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I’ve had so much fun sharing my own gardening photos this year, and last week, I invited you to email me some of yours, too!

Cheri’s Garden

Cheri writes at the blog Sweet Home Northwest and recently built some bins to grow potatoes. She writes, “This is the first time I’ve tried growing potatoes.  Growing much of anything for that matter.  We needed three bins for red potatoes, yukon golds, and russets.”

And here is her bin with potatoes growing in it. I love this!

Cheri has also been growing some raspberries…

And blueberries! Lovely!

For more information, you can check out Cheri’s blog post on how she built the potato bins as well as a recent garden update.

Jackee’s Garden

Jackee lives in Western Washington, and this is her first year gardening – which is going to surprise you in just a moment. They repurposed some old wooden fencing in their backyard to create 18 4X4 boxes and 3 8X4 boxes!

Here is her before picture:

And the “after:”

Isn’t that just beautiful? I love it! You can follow more of Jackee’s garden updates at GrowEasyGarden.

Shelly’s Garden

Shelly has been gardening for 18 years and lives in the Portland area. She recently started her blog Frugal Family Home, which highlights some of her garden and how she preserves the bounty.

Aren’t these containers lovely? Here’s another container:

And some beans she’s growing vertically…

Shelly writes: “A tip I have for a new gardener would be to start small and add more space as you go so you don’t get overwhelmed. Also if your space is limited you can grow vertically many different crops such as Cucumbers, beans, squash, and peas. This saves garden space and can increase your yield.”

I love how Shelly also shared some of the eats she’s made with her garden bounty, too:

Here is some jam made from her raspberry plants:

If you’re interested in not only gardening, but finding a way to preserve produce, please follow Shelly’s blog. She says her blog is newer, but I imagine she’ll have much more trusty advice to share in the near future!

Amanda’s Garden

Amanda lives in Kent and this is her first year gardening! She writes: “a third of my garden is planted in the ground and 2/3rds of it is in pots because I moved from an apartment to a house with an actual backyard midway through summer. Next year after I learn some more about raised planters I plan on putting a few in because so far this gardening thing has been super fun and surprisingly pretty easy. I love thinking about what’s for dinner then going out back and grabbing some instead of heading to the store!”

Growing in the pots above: 1 Bean, 2 Bell Peppers, 2 Strawberries, 1 Ghost Pepper, and 1 Habanero Pepper.

Growing here: lettuce, tomatoes, and peas! Amanda shares that a few potatoes are here, but are hard to see given some of the weeds.

If those look like blackberries, they are! Amanda says they belong to the neighbor, but they enjoy the berries that spill over onto their side of the fence! I say that’s pretty resourceful, Amanda! (In case you missed it, you might want to check out my post on picking and preserving wild blackberries too.)

Shannon’s Garden

Shannon lives near Salt Lake City and is following the Square Foot Gardening method.

She shares that overall she is happy with the results of this method and that her plants are huge! She does share that next year she will space some of her plants a bit farther apart.

She adds: “we are growing 6 varieties of tomatoes, butternut and spaghetti squash, cucumbers, watermelon, peppers, onions (because of your suggestion) and a few herbs. My kids just planted a square for carrots, but they haven’t sprouted yet.”

Check out tehse beautiful tomatoes!

And watermelon? Hello! That’s how you know Shannon clearly does NOT live anywhere near me.

Squash can really take off if you let it! How fun!

Shannon’s favorite garden snack!

Nice, healthy tomato plants:

Now that’s a cuke! I love how Shannon is growing these vertically.

My Own Garden

I snapped a few interesting updates in my garden yesterday, too.

Aren’t these rainbow carrots fun?? I honestly have had an issue with getting a bunch of them to grow, but at least we got a few to enjoy. My husband wanted to pop them into the Vitamix yesterday, but I wanted to save them for a dish you could actually see and enjoy the pretty colors.

The spiders are coming! I’ve noticed that about this time each year, the spiders really start getting busy! I found a number of them in my tomato plants too. Here a spider enjoys a tasty beetle for lunch! Do you suppose this spider is the same kind I found as babies in my garden late May?

My bean trellis is still coming along, a bit slower than I wanted, but I’m out there every day training it along the string. The plant is full of thick beans, too, which I will let dry.

Plenty of lemon cucumbers coming along! I’m hopeful that the hot weather we’re about to have this weekend will finish some of ‘em off!

Thanks to all the readers who participated! If you have a blog post about your garden, please feel free to share it!