mamapundit

I don’t get a lot of time to be all by myself and grieve. But this spring, during this month marking the second anniversary of what I thought at the time was the most awful span of weeks life could possibly throw at me (I just didn’t know yet what June, July and August had in store), I’ve been spending late nights after the rest of the fam is in bed, sitting out on our porch, swinging on the porch swing, listening to music and thinking about my boy.

During May, I have found myself lighting all the lanterns and candles on our porch and hanging from our fig tree every night, sort of figuratively lighting our house for Henry to see, and know that I am there, sitting on the porch looking for him. I don’t mean this in a crazypants way; I don’t literally think he’s going to come strolling up the sidewalk and yell out to me that he’s home. But each night right now, I just want there to be some tangible, visible expression of my grief out under the springtime moon. I want the universe to know that I long for him, and I’m still his mother. That he’s not forgotten, and that I am marking this month – with each day that brings me closer to May 31 – in some explicit way. I want the house to look as warm and cozy and loving as he knew it, as a signal to…whomever that I am working hard to honor what I know Henry wanted, which was for me to continue to have lavender and flowers growing under the stars, and flickering paper lanterns and porch swings and music in my life until we are together again, and for me to make sure that his little brother and sisters have the healthy mama and happy home they deserve. He loved them so much.

I have no clue if any of that fmakes one lick of sense to anyone, or if I sound utterly nuts. But that’s just the best way I can figure out how to explain what I’m doing out there night after night.

Last night, just after midnight, everyone else in was indoors asleep and I was out on the porch with Leo (dog) abd Moses (cat), listening to Marshall Crenshaw’s first record and weeping, missing Henry so much. But in my sadness, I had this sudden thought that the house looked very sweet all lit up in the quiet night, so I went into the yard, turned around and took this photo.

In the 10k-plus photos I’ve taken in the 24 months since Henry died (and the few dozen anyone has taken of me during the same period), this is only the second one that’s ever turned out like this. And the photos I took immediately after don’t look like that at all.

I’ve been planning to add some raised beds with veggies, pumpkins and watermelons to my front-of-house gardening expansion, and I’d researched the best way to build them. I also considered going with one of the raised bed kits that are out there.

After talking to others and considering the options l, I decided to go with two of the Greene’s brand, cedar raised bed kits.

These kits are modular, so you can put them together in various ways, and they are made of wonderful-smelling cedar that’s chemical-free. They require NO tools except a screwdriver to add the end caps. Everything just slides together in dovetailed pieces.

Today, for Mother’s Day, I went and bought my Greene’s kits at Home Depot.

I got them home and began assembling, and quickly realized that they were going to be every bit as easy to assemble as advertised. Total snap. Here’s how the corners fit together.

Within 20 minutes I had the whole thing set up where I wanted the new beds to be – along my fence row.

The beds are extremely sturdy and well made, and I think that the end caps on each corner give them a nice finished look. I plan to paint mine purple (!!!)

My only complaint is that the single kits aren’t really deep enough for any plant that has serious roots, unless you prep the soil under. But because they’re modular, it’s easy to make them as deep as you need by stacking.

If you’re considering building or buying raised garden beds, I’d definitely recommend these Greene’s kits.

And if any of y’all have any tried and true tips for raised bed veggie gardening – especially growing pumpkins or watermelons in raised beds – I’d love it if you would share with me in the comments below.
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I got this at the garden festival yesterday to put in my flower bed to remember Henry on this, my second Mother’s Day without him.