Everything looks lovely. Keep up the good work.

You are off to a great start! I have been expanding and tweaking my raised bed garden over the last three years. This year I decided to try a more formal potager look but the budget didn't allow for spending very much so I took my existing beds apart and reassembled them into new shapes and arranged them into more of a potager design. It is far from finished, but the journey is half the fun. I am constantly thinking of things I want to add. Next spring I want to build an arbor with a gate at the entrance, and a bench seat under an arbor at the opposite end. I look at the pictures here of all the different potagers and drool lol! I find this forum a great source of inspiration, and only wish it was more active.

I love the way you are mixing flowers and vegetables. That is true potager style, and something I want to do more of.

Gardens always look underwhelming at this time of year, but i think it's going to look beautiful when things start to grow up those structures you have. So it's not too early to plant tomatoes in WI? Only this week here in zone 6 have the night temps been above 50! What part of the state are you in? My first veg. garden was in Madison, on the isthmus.

Thanks all - I look at the pics here and tend to only notice all the weeds and clutter - and wish I had waited to post after I had gotten a tidier look, but I was excited about how it was going and wanted to share.

Egg&dart- Its a tad early for tomatoes but they have only been in the ground three days and it has stayed above 48 at night and looks to only get warmer. They were just getting to tall to leave them in the plastic cups I started them in, and I didnt want to re pot them all. I am an hour east of the Twin-Cities.

Canokie- I want to continue adding more and more flowers to this garden. Last year my favorite part was an arched trellis that had cucumbers and morning glory growing up it and little begonias planted under it.

Mandolls -- great productive garden, which is what it's all about, right? Don't worry about the clutter, a garden is a work in progress. Your flowers will be lovely when the weather warms for you. You've been busy planting and it shows!

Did you try putting bottomless milk jugs over the tomatoes during cool days & nights? Or you can fill jugs with water or a tea solution to attract heat. Then place the jugs around your tomatoes to hold in more heat. They like it warm, warm, warm. If you still have a chance of frost you might want to buy some row cover, too. Sheer curtains also work. Plastic unless a hoop design doesn't really keep heat in, so don't lay a sheet of plastic on plants as they can't touch them, either. I tried reusing colored plastic tablecloths once at the end of the season & it doesn't work! Bed sheets do. Make sure they don't touch the tomato plants. You can stick in a few tomato cages to help hold up the covering even if you don't use them for supports. Take it off in the morning once temps are over 50 degrees. Don't leave them on during rain or wind unless you have staked or weighed down every single edge and corner. Will damage your plants for the season. :o) Learned that too.

The morning glories are my favorite flower in the summer garden, but usually the last thing I get to planting. Every year I try to do more decorative things.

Nasturtium & dwarf dahlia work well for trap crops for me here for aphids & slugs. I like them even if they didn't bloom. Easy enough to plant the seeds and dahlias are in the store right now in 4" pots. You can overwinter the tubers and replant next year if you dig them up after 1st frost.

Keep up the great gardening & you'll have lots of summer vegetables ahead ~
Corrine

I personally never grow morning glories or nastutium IN my vege garden! They are total pests around here! I do have them a little away from the garden, nast are in the herb container garden (I have to rip them out by the handful every couple of weeks) and MGs are nearby in a couple of sitting areas.
It took me several years to get the MGs out of the vege garden. I will let the nasties grow around the raised beds, but pull them the second I see one pop up IN the boxes! Nancy

Love the way you have put herbs, flowers and veggies together. Really love the broccoli with petunias, that's going to be lovely. You've done so much work, enjoy it, it's wonderful.

Corine - I put in the tomatoes and then we had a mini heat wave! We had two days close to 90, with plenty of rain too. I think the tomatoes loved it. They are all about 2 ft now and most have blossoms. It is back down to normal (for end of May in WI) temps of high 60's in the day and about 50 at night. Its perfect digging weather. Last year I got cole crops started early (mid-April) in hoop houses that I put together. This year I just didnt find the time.

Nancy Jane - I have to admit that I have pulled at least 3 dozen Morning glory seedlings, but I dont really mind it. Nasturtiums dont re-seed themselves abundantly here. I think last year I ran across three or four, this year I havent seen any yet. It has to be really hardy to become a big pest in WI.

Thanks Macgregor - Yesterday I finished planting one of the arches - pole beans up them, burgandy bush beans next to them on the outside, purple cabbage on the inside, all bordered with curly parsley. The purple cabbage and the parsley are going to look great when it grows in, especially when the beans are blooming. Dont need "flowers" in that bed.

Three weeks later - still a lot to do, I have ordered lumber and edging bricks to be delivered next week. I got a little more work done on the paths, and more today which isnt in the pics. But...the plants are looking good even if the structure isnt there yet.

Hard to see, but my first borage bloom - hoping for lots.

Baby Romaine Lettuce, bush beans and a few Petunias, blanket flower will bloom soon.

A rabbit has been keeping my beans trimmed down, so not many have made it up the arches yet. I found this little iron birdbath at a junk store for $16, couldn't pass it up.

The violas are blooming like crazy with the peppers and eggplant

And one little eggplant flower - THese are the prettiest vegetables, I just wish the insects didt like them as much as I do.

Brussle Sprouts and red cabbage, next to one of the cucumber arches (cukes havent started to do much yet) Lettuce and lobelia planted inside the arch.

And the Broccoli is forming heads and the flambe petunias are stating to kick in.

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By the end of June it should be looking great, if it doesnt get devoured by bugs and full of disease.