With the woes of my last year’s garden, you’d think I’ll run as fast as my chunky little legs can take me away from gardening, but I didn’t. I did plant another garden, and this one is doing way better than the 2025 garden at this time of the year.
In the beginning of this gardening journey, I was a bit hesitant on spending money because last year felt like I literally buried my money in the ground. Okay, I’ll stop talking about last year now; it’s sending chills down my spine 😬
As I was saying, I wanted to spend the least amount of money possible while making sure I don’t repeat last year’s mistakes (okay, no mention of last year again! 😃). I wanted to figure out how to grow more and spend less. Honestly, getting my hands in the dirt was exactly what my soul needed during a season when adulthood felt incredibly hard,
The Scrap Yard Garden: How to Grow More with Free Wood
First, I knew I had to do raised beds. With the number of things I wanted to plant, that would cost more than I was willing to spend for something I wasn’t sure of. But God being so gracious, my friend turned sister got a new house. What do new houses need? A fence!!! What happens when you build a fence??? That’s right, you have scrap wood! And that’s how I got scrap wood to build my raised beds.
Garden beds that I built from scrap wood. Oshey, Darmiey the carpenter!!
Earning My Degree in Weed Eradication
Second issue was weeds. After earning my weed eradication degree from YouTube University and Gemini AI, I found out that the cheapest way to kill weeds is to choke them out with scrap cardboard. All your Amazon delivery boxes come in handy here; I’m glad I saved mine. So, I laid the cardboard on the grass and put my raised beds on top.
Them no born those little turds called weeds to pour sand in my garri this year.
The Free Seed Starting Hack to Spend Less
Now for my latest scrap trick: egg cartons! I recently started buying eggs in bulk, so they come in cardboard cartons inside a large box. This is totally different from the printed styrofoam cartons I used to buy. When I saw seed starting boxes at the store, I looked at the price and was like, “No be egg carton be this?” So, I decided to use my cardboard egg cartons as seed starting trays.
I used my leftover seed starting mix from last year, put my seeds in, and started them inside. I placed the cartons on a plastic tray so it didn’t make a mess on my counter, and it worked beautifully!
The absolute best part? I didn’t have to disturb the roots when it was time to move them. Because the cardboard carton is biodegradable, I just detached each section and planted it directly in the ground, carton and all!
I actually ran a little experiment and had two sets of starts: some in a plastic crate outside and some in the egg cartons indoors. The ones in the plastic crate suffered a bit of root disturbance during transplanting. Meanwhile, the egg carton ones had none. Luckily, both sets are thriving now!
If you do use this hack, just make sure not to overwater your egg cartons, as they can easily disintegrate since they weren’t exactly manufactured to handle tons of water. Please don’t ask me how I know this 😬
The Genius Secret to Spending Less on Soil
Third issue was soil. My backyard soil is clay, It is very hard to till and doesn’t readily absorb water. A nightmare for plants! This is where I had to spend money in a strategic way. I bought two bags of garden soil, but I had to creatively fill my raised beds, so I did some research and figured out how to stretch my soil.
Last fall, we raked a lot of dead leaves and put them in a pile in the backyard. Thank God the leaves were not trashed, so they became the bottom layer sitting right on top of the cardboard. I piled a ton of leaves and stepped on them, added water, and stepped more to compact them.
Then, I took my old crates with hard soil, loosened it up, and added my compost to the old soil. I mixed it with some of those fall leaves (crushed) to keep it loose, and this was the second layer. Then I put the new garden soil on top, and this way, I was able to stretch the soil.
After this, I watered the soil, then planted my seeds and transplants, gave it a light sprinkle of water, and it worked!!!
Did you find any of these tips helpful? Let me know if you have any questions, and stay tuned for more garden updates!
