Garlic Planting and raised bed prep

So we got stuck in the idea of "raised" beds for the garden.The Vegetable Gardner's Bible, by Edward C. Smith has such wonderful suggestions that we couldn't resist. So I am uploading some pictures of the garden just to give you the idea of what I am talking about. In his book he suggests mounding the dirt up and planting your garden in the "mounds" thus providing better protection and more control of the PH levels in the soil, thus yielding more food per square foot.

This is mom planting garlic.


Our garlic cloves all broken up and ready for planting. This lovely garlic is Lorz Itialian.


The garlic must be heavily mulched or it will get "winter kill" so this layer of stuff will protect the ground from freezing. This is 2+ inches of shredded paper followed buy about 4 inches of hay. We wanted to do leaves but have yet to get any.


The girls in the garden.


This is the final product. Two beautiful rows of planted and mulched garlic. See what I mean about mounding the soil up to create raised beds. I am sure it will make more sense when we have the whole garden finished. However that is ALOT of soil to move and we love our backs, so we're taking it slowly.


I found this little guy/girl when I was getting the hay out to cover the garlic. Aren't praying mantis's cool?