What ONE bulb of garlic caused...

Okay.... so the garden hasn't been tended to all year.

 Yes, you read that right. All year. Little scruffy, isn't it?

Oh, I've meant to, but one thing or another has gotten in my way.Read the other posts in this blog to see all the things that might have kept me from working outside. (Mainly the 90 degree weather -- or higher!!)

Well, I went to the Garlic Festival in Bennington, VT again (always on Labor Day weekend) and this year I decided to try planting garlic, so I bought a bulb. Yup. One bulb. Well, I've never done this before and I figure that if I don't like it, then I 've only done one bulb worth of garlic.

Well, since I couldn't plant it in a garden that had gotten so overgrown, I had to at least clear out a patch of dirt. and well, you know how that is....

 I got part of it cleared (mostly taking out tall grasses and dead violet plants--those overtake the garden every year), but notice what I had to contend with? ROOTS!!!! Little, spindle-y roots. Some I had to chop with a hatchet, but mostly pull out by hand, which killed my back. I turned the dirt over by shovel and it was easy enough to pull out EVERYTHING , but the roots.

One thing I did realize was that I had wonderful worms in the garden. Goooood! Love it! Made me think of my co-worker, Glo, who is deathly afraid of worms. (wonder why...)

 I did leave in the irises, two tomato plants who haven't bit the bullet' yet, a thyme and basil plant and some day lillies. But that was all. I was so sore and crippled from all the back-breaking work I haven't done in ages, that I couldn't plant the silly little bulb of garlic, until the next day. (Oh, I did find lots of scallions-- I thought I'd only planted a few-- and planted some more in the little area with the garlic. This area is in the lower right side of the photo. I marked it with the large rocks going into the garden on the right and filled in more rocks around the the bottom of the photo.) .... It looks good, but the garden on the back left still needs to be done. Maybe before the snow flies....