Below, finally, are pictures of my yard and garden.

Just as a point of comparison, this is what the yard looked like when we moved in.

This is what it looks like now.

As you can see, not all of it isSquareFootGarden, though I hope to add more next year. I’m planning to add raised beds to areas, such as the edge of the alley side fence, which do nothing but grow weeds. That way I’ll be making use of my space to grow vegetables and my husband will have much less work weed whacking.

Yes, those really are my peas cascading over. I never thought they would grow so high and I didn’t think they would still be producing in July. They are now impinging on my squash plants and slowing the growth of my summer squash by providing shade. I’ll have to cut them back soon. Perhaps I’ll grow them up the fence next year instead.

I realize that the cover on this bed is totally messed up. My husband is hoping to add some corner posts to better hold up the chicken wire cage. Honestly, I’d rather do without the cover all together. But for some reason it’s the only deterrent to squirrels that actually works. But unfortunately it is also a deterrent to harvesting and weeding so I have lettuce that really needs to be picked and weeds to be pulled out. (Fortunately most of the weeds are growing in the concrete outside the bed.)

I have no idea if these potato barrels were work, but it was what I had so I figured I didn’t have anything to lose. I got such a late start on these that I probably won’t have a crop until September or October anyway.

So far I’ve harvested about 3 pounds of peas, half a pound of lettuce, 1 pound of green beans, 1 pound of strawberries. The strawberries were a very light harvest because I pinched back most of the blooms so that next year I will get a larger harvest. But apparently I missed a few. I may still yet get a small fall harvest from my everbearing strawberry plants.

The small planter in the lower right of the picture is an experiment with corn. I have no idea if I will get any ears, but I decided to try it out anyway. It probably isn’t worth the space given how inexpensive corn is locally when it is in season, so I probably won’t plant it again next year.

It’s safe to say that my garden doesn’t pay for itself yet. But I’m learning a lot each year and eventually I’ll run out of space to adding new beds so my yearly costs will decrease.