She Dreams of the Sea

Magic at Dawn

 

No more shunning darkness

or

turning my back on midnight

it's time for integration

it's time to embrace it all

sunshine

storms

summer

winter

forest

desert

laughter

melancholy

peace

chaos

it's time for integration

it's time to embrace it all

Moon Garden

 

I've always had a deep connection to Mother Earth and her creatures. But lately I've been feeling a need to connect with her even more. The way I've been connecting recently is through gardening. To continue where I left off from my last post, I am going to talk about gardening in harmony with the phases of the moon. There are scientific reasons and spiritual reasons for gardening this way. Scientifically speaking it is believed that the moon influences ocean levels, tides and water, the moon pulls water upward bringing moisture to seeds. On a spiritual level, gardening in line with the phases of the moon is like writing a love letter to Mother Earth letting her know that you now desire to live more in harmony and balance with her.

Gardening in line with the phases of the moon is beautiful and simple. On the day of the new moon or the day of the full moon you would not plant anything. The day after the new moon to the full moon, the waxing phase, is the time to plant above ground plants such as tomatoes, greens, herbs, peppers and cabbage. On the day and week after the full moon, the beginning of the waning phase, is the time to plant below ground plants such as, garlic, onions, radishes, parsnips and carrots.

The last quarter of the moon phase (the week before the new moon) is not the time to plant but to harvest.

Reconnecting

 

If you feel disconnected from mother earth,

if you feel disconnected from your heart,

if you feel disconnected from your joy,

plant a garden.

I haven't gardened much in the past couple years. I've always loved having a garden and always gardened the typical way or container gardened. This year I have done some research and am experimenting with a “no dig,” “no till” garden. Some people call it lasagna gardening. It's a gentle way to garden, there is no disturbing of soil and it is pretty simple.

So how do you create a no dig garden?

To put it very simply, you make layers.

In composting there are materials called green material

and brown material.

In no dig gardening you make layers of green material and brown material.

Green material is something such as fresh grass clippings, brown material is something such as dried leaves or straw.

 

There are lots of ways to create a no dig garden,

here is the way I did mine.

 

First I decided on the size I wanted. I decided on 9ft by 3ft.

Then I created a border (this is optional) I put stakes and chicken wire around the garden. I did this to discourage the neighbor's dogs from running through the garden. (Well actually the sweet hubster did this part:) Some people use large stones as a border.

Then I started to build the layers. I just alternated green layers with brown layers. You are supposed to use a little more brown than green.

Before starting the layers I put down card board as the base layer, cut in pieces and soaked in water. Some organic gardeners like card board because the worms like it, some organic gardeners don't like it. So this part is also optional.

Then I began the layering process.

A brown layer-Autumn leaves

A green layer-fresh grass clippings

A brown layer-straw

A green layer- mushroom compost

 I repeated this until it was about two feet high.

If you are going to do this in the Fall you would let it sit until Spring. If you are going to do this in the Spring then the top layer should be soil so you can plant right away. Well this is the beginning of my experiment. The photo is about halfway through the layering process.  (The garden looks a little lopsided in the photo for some reason)

I am also planting in harmony with the phases of the moon.

I'll tell you about that next time.

xo