Off to new gardens.

I have a new project. Something to start from basically 0. That is a good excuse to start a #gardenjournal, don't you think?

In May, we moved the bakery to a new location. While we were getting everything ready for the production, the owner, a good friend of mine I call Mr. K, worked on renovating the back. The idea is to create a restaurant space for my administrator (D), who's also a chef and always wanted his own restaurant - so why not combine both? Said and done.

Unfortunately, the strike got in the way, as well as some other hurdles we hadn't anticipated properly. So now, we have one month left to get everything in shape, before I go to Germany and D has a foot surgery. While I vacation, he'll recover, and we'll come back swinging in January.

One of the perks of the new location is the huge and beautiful garden, including the most wonderful Avocado Tree whose growth strongly invites to climb on it, which Lily and her friends did right away. It also carries strong branches, which will provide support for swings, climbing ropes and such. But enough talk, let's talk project.

This is the view from the pergola-patio. Sorry for the stain in the right, my camera is broken and the sun creates those if in the wrong angle. As mentioned, the tree is going to be a children paradise. You can see right next to it what is going to be a sand box with toys.

On the left side, we have a mix of concrete block wall, adobe wall, and brick wall. The block wall is going to be covered by plants which I'll try to get this week, probably tomorrow. Ivy is my first candidate, but if you have any other suggestions of fast growing plant that thrives in the Sierra of Ecuador - let me know!

On both sides I'm going to take out a stripe, so the sides are earth to plant stuff. With the twist that I'm going to put in some high beds on the right to grow some veggies and stuff, and use those to teach children how to garden as well - not me, but a friend of mine who is a professional gardener and loves to contribute to the community as much as me.

The yard is going to be mostly grass, for Yoga and other kind of outdoor compatible training.

There already are some beautiful plants that I want to keep, or even propagate. Like this blackberry variant which is mostly seedless and delicious:

There is also a Brugmansia, which I will have to either mark as poisonous or somehow fence it off the rest, as I don't want to have any problems with kids rubbing their face in the flowers. It's a beautiful flower, though, and currently in blossom.

Mr. K had planted a few bushes already, and one of those just produced this beautiful flower. I'm not sure what it is, but with my limited knowledge I'd say it's some kind of Amaryllis:

The pergola patio is quite the chaos for now. There's still a lot to do, get some art on the walls, both murals and frames. The good thing is that Lily's mom moved to Cotacachi, and will be spending more time with the little one, so I have at least some more time on my hands.

I'm really excited to see how this all evolves. This is my (garden) checklist:

1. Cut the edges into the dirt to create visible stripes on the sides.
2. Get some ivy (and other) plants as well as some cutlings, and plant them in those stripes.
3. Fill the sand box, put the swings and the climbing rope in place.
4. Create a garden residue compost behind the fig tree (picture needed!)
5. Build (or have built) high beds and fill them with some good earth to grow veggies.

I'm pretty sure I'll find a lot more tasks on the way. But this should be enough to start my Garden Journal, don't you think? It would be a great way to keep track of my progress.

By the way, I have no idea what the garden journal challenge is about. I hope I interpreted it right. 😅

Thank you for reading! Please feel free to engage in any original way, including dropping links to your posts on similar topics. I'm happy to read (and curate) any quality content that is not created by LLM/AI, as well as read your own experience and point of view, I love to learn!