The Bucket List: Gardening On The Cheap

I’m always whining about gardening in El Paso and how difficult it’s been for me. So this year I resolved to have container gardens. Since money is tight and I’m planting seeds. But I’m also looking for instant color, so I’m buying mostly annuals, which pretty much goes against everything I’ve ever believed in. I believe perennials give you more bang for your buck, like years worth of bang. But I can’t afford to spend $12.99 or more on a plant that might day in a week. So I’m going with annuals and a few veggies.

Because I’m spending money on annuals, I can’t really afford to go out and buy the beautiful pots I’d like to get. But I need deep containers so my plants will think they’re in the ground. So I’m trash can and bucket gardening. No one can see the garden but us, because it’s inside our courtyard where I can keep an eye on it 24/7. I’ve gone around and collected all the unused trash cans we’ve got, and I’ve been buying buckets. The cheapest buckets I’ve found are the Home Depot utility buckets for $2.79. I drill holes in the bottom, drop in some newspaper and rocks for drainage, then add my special soil mixture. And of course (the most important part) I’m turning the bucket so the giant Home Depot ad doesn’t show.

Here’s a pepper plant and his friends oregano, snap dragon, and the petunia gang. I took this shot about a week ago.

And here it is this morning. So far, so good.

Here’s some lovely bucket salvia.

Here’s some bucket petunias below:

And here’s my one big perennial splurge, trash can Rudbeckia and a hollyhock.

I went to the store yesterday with a specific “bucket list” of what I wanted and here they are below. I’ve got to plant these today. They’re already well on the way to looking good (unlike the half-dead marked down K-Mart plants I bought weeks ago), so hopefully they’ll keep on keeping on and encourage the rest of the garden to do the same.

I’ll keep playing chakra music to my bucket garden and talking to it, and I just know the garden will cooperate. OR I WILL FLIP OUT.

I’m not really supposed to on here right now, taking photos and blogging, because I’ve got too much work to do so I’m gonna run. Happy gardening, everyone!