A few years ago, I made my niece, Tiffany, a garden journal. Ever since, I have wanted to make myself one, too! Only problem was, I was not doing much in the way of gardening!
But two years ago, when I retired, I promised myself I would get my garden back into shape. Here where we live in rural Montana, we have voracious deer. I tried for years to grow flowers and vegetables, but no matter how many Anti-Deer Gimmicks I tried; no matter how many deer-resistant plants I bought and put in the ground; everything was decimated by those gentle-looking creatures. About 20 years ago, my dear husband, Larry, kindly built me a deer-proof garden by putting up a 7-foot fence around a 30' x 40' plot of ground. For years I grew raspberries, strawberries, flowers and herbs in my lovely garden spot. But life got crazy and I just let things go for some years.
Last year, I started experimenting with container planting. Because this was new to me, I wanted to document what worked, what did not, and how and when I planted things. It was now perfect timing for a Garden Journal!
I had this Kraft board journal in my Stash. I found some lovely paper that matched the dark pink fabric spine cover and lined the covers inside and out. The journal came with some pages and dividers. I made pockets on each side of the dividers with the leftover floral paper. I had some lined journaling paper in my stash, and glued that on both sides of cardstock pages I made to fit inside the dividers. There were only 4 heavy cardstock Kraft paper dividers, so right now, I only have enough for the next three years of journaling. But I can probably fit at least 6 years into this album, and I figure I can trace the dividers I have and make more.
When I cleaned up the garden, after the first hard frost, I retrieved all the tags from what I had planted, taped them to the pages of the journal, and documented what I though about them, how well they grew, and whether I felt they were worth bothering with again. I even graded the flowers from a 1 (least likely to purchase again) to a 10 (most likely to purchase again), taking all that into consideration. I am so pleased with my Journal!
