Cinderblock Gardening

This spring, we moved upstairs in the house we were living, and therefore got more creative liberty with the yard and garden. Being on a budget, as we are, I started looking on Pinterest for DIY Planter Boxes and fell in love with the cinderblock look!

We found some, incredibly cheap, at the ReStore in Saskatoon, and went to town! Other than cinderblocks, all you need is construction adhesive, hardware cloth or chicken wire, and landscaping cloth.

Adrian and I had fun piecing them together and finding the pattern that looked the best. We settled on two walls - one for mostly culinary herbs, but also some splashes of colours with flowers, and one in our sitting area featuring bug repelling plants. 

I'm in love with the look, and they have done so well! I've really been impressed.

This is how they looked when I first planted everything. I was late in getting things in, so this didn't happen until the first of July! Next year i'll get started sooner.

In this one, i've got parsley, basil, peppermint, cilantro, lavender, sage, oregano, marigolds, geranium, lobelia, and a couple more bright, hanging flowers.

In this, our smaller bug repelling wall, we've got marigolds, geranium, lemon balm, lemon thyme, rosemary, basil, peppermint, lavender, bee balm and an extra lobelia for added colour.

What each plant repels:

Marigolds: mosquitoes, 

Geranium: mosquitoes, beetles

Lemon Balm: mosquitoes

Lemon Thyme: mosquitoes

Rosemary: slugs, flies, mosquitoes

Basil: flies, mosquitoes

Peppermint: flies, aphids, mosquitoes, some beetles

Lavender: moths, fleas, flies, mosquitoes

Bee balm: mosquitoes

I wanted to also get lemongrass and citronella, but couldn't find any, late as I was getting these in the first place. I'll try again next spring for those.

Two weeks later, we've already got some growth!

I ended up moving the lavender into a big pot so that it had more room to take off.

Two weeks later, there's explosive growth!

And these are the most recent pictures... Two weeks later. Unbelievable growth and very ready to harvest! It amazes me how fast changes happen in nature.

I absolutely love the look of these, and am so happy we did it! All in all, including plants, black earth, manure, peat moss, the cinderblocks, construction cloth and adhesive, and landscaping cloth, we spent about $150 for all of this! I'd say that's a pretty good price for what we got out of it!

We plan on making a few oil infusions with some herbs for winter cooking, and are hoping to bring a few inside to over-winter. We'll see how that goes!