The size of your garden depends upon what you expect of it, the time you can devote to it and your experience. Beginning gardeners should limit their first effort to an area no larger than 10 feet by 15 feet. The minimum would be a container on your porch or patio. A small, well-kept garden can produce more vegetables and pleasure than a larger garden that is out of hand. Think July when you decide how big your garden should be.

Locate the garden in the most favorable site for plant growth that is available. At least six hours of direct sun are necessary for most vegetables to grow well. Less sun does not rule out a vegetable garden, but it limits your choice of vegetables to shade tolerant plants like lettuce. The garden site should be well drained. Avoid areas where cold air flows into stagnant pockets. These frost-prone areas severely limit the length of the growing season.

The same thing can be done if you take your vacation in early summer. You can plant cover crops in the spring and begin serious gardening in mid or late July. There are enough vegetables that will mature when planted as late as the first two weeks of August to fill your garden.

Multiple cropping in your garden requires planning. Give careful attention to the number of days required for a given variety to reach maturity and the earliest and latest date it can be planted. I have found the days to maturity given in seed catalogs to be optimistic. Conditions in the home garden are not ideal enough to produce maximum growth.