Winter in Wisconsin can sometimes be nice, but this December has started out as a lesson in dismal.   The picture above looking out to the garden area from the house was taken a week ago.  It was our first significant snow.  We received about four inches of really wet stuff that most snow blowers can’t handle and shoveling breaks your back.

South Beds

This picture was taken yesterday.  On-and-off rains have melted most of the snow, but sunshine has not been apparent for quite some time.  The beds are mostly in good shape, but I still have to get my covering of leaves in there.  Travel and bad weather have put me behind.  I’m hoping for some dry weather before everything freezes up solid with a snow cover on top.  We get a lot more warm winter days than we used to, so I can hope I’ll get a chance to cover things up before spring.

Garlic Bed

Looking north the garlic bed with its bright straw adds a little color to the mostly dirty scene.

North Beds

This is the north garden area. It purposely borders on the wild.  I’ve got an excellent pile of makings for compost, but building the structured pile will again be a spring project.  I’m actually quite glad I don’t have to garden throughout the winter, but that’s because I’m old.  I used to do a lot more season-extending gardening with hoop tunnels and more cold hardy crops, but I am slowing down, so hard work is becoming less and less interesting.