Mother Earth News had a story in their most recent issue about putting instant gardens over lawns using newspaper, mulch and growing medium. Since I'd already started the gardens and Mom kept asking when I'm planting the rest of the tomatoes, I decided to give the newspaper mulch a try in her garden. I laid down wet paper over the closely cropped grass in the garden, cut out holes to plant the tomatoes and laid down some composted cow manure over the paper. I got in 12 more plants, then used grass clippings to weigh down the paper. I need to lay block walkways yet, but so far the garden looks terrific. We'll see how it goes. It would be GREAT if it actually keeps the weeding to a minimum!

I planted New Zealand blue squash and Mandan squash (two weeks late), zucchini and cantaloupe (on time) in peat pellet starters. The squash are going in my garden with the Black Krim tomatoes (which are doing well) and the zucchini & cantaloupe are going in Mom's garden.