8 2009-11-06T16:22:05-06:00 false Hi everyone! I'm a newbie gardener from Chicago, IL. I just bought a house with my husband in the Northwest Side of the city (Albany Park neighborhood). I've never had much of a green thumb, but now I _own land_! It makes me want to.... cultivate! Some sort of mid-western, corn-fed, farmer heritage thing has been awakened within me. Every night this summer I would run home to work in the backyard until there was no more light for me plant my shovel by. I've got the gardening bug bad and I don't want a cure! I've been having so much fun! Most of this summer was spent bringing back our awesome little postage-stamp backyard from the wreck it was left in. Because of the crash, the house sat empty for almost a year before we bought it. The backyard was mostly giant weeds among a huge ring of sand and gravel left from a removed above-ground pool. My husband and I regraded and reseeded the yard ourselves in late August and the grass is really starting to fill in and look lovely! (you can see the photos from then to now that I attached or see a timelapse video "here":http://fearlesscrafts.wordpress.com/2009/08/11/reseeding-the-lawn/ ). Now that the lawn portion of the yard is in relative order I am already plotting (pun intended :) for an amazing Veggie Garden for next year! I'm a pretty big nerd and I've created a "big spreadsheet":http://clients.astekweb.com/perm/khawkey/blog/2010_Vegetable_Chart.xls with all my research that I thought some of you might find useful (Chicago FYI is 5a Zone). I came across this site because I was looking for a tool to help journal my plant progress and research - little did I know such a cool tool would also come with a whole community of amazing gardeners from around the world! Please let me know if things like this spreadsheet are helpful to people or if you see any information in my spreadsheet that should be corrected! 0 false 70571 false false false Entry 2009-11-06T00:00:00-06:00 DMY 86517 Public 2009-11-06T16:22:06-06:00 12244 Overcast 60 F