My first attempt at gardening!

Now that we've moved and are not sharing our yard with 10 neighbors we can plant a garden!! I was so excited about this. Now I'm thinking will this garden save me money? I know it will save me the convenience of having to run to the grocery store for fresh produce every week, not mention these veggies/fruits will be fresh! What about money? So far here what I've spent:

2 indoor starter beds $10.00
approximately 15 seed packets $20.00
1 strawberry root $3.00
gas for the tiller I borrowed from my father-in-law $5.00
watering can for the indoor plants $3.00

So far we're talking $41 and I can't remember if I've bought anything else.
Now figure in the water bill as the garden will need deep watering I'm guessing twice a week? Someone correct me if I'm wrong....... this is my first time. So we will save money if anything actually grows! LOL

So here's what I've done. We tilled up a nice area in the back yard behind the garage (there was already a rather large bare spot in the grass there) The soil seemed really good. Black and damp so I figured I didn't need to spend extra getting any bags of soil. I planted some indoor stuff to transfer later and then we planted everything else outside. We planted:

Sweet Corn
Carrots
Cucumber
Parsley
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Onion
Tomatoes
Jalapenos
Bell peppers
Banana peppers
Watermelon
Strawberries
Cantaloupe

I hope they grow!! Any and ALL gardening tips welcome!!

Van problems

Ok, so most of you know that our van has been giving us problems as of late. It first started with a jerking sensation while the van was trying to shift.... or so I thought it was happen while trying to shift. The van give a pretty good jerk and then it started happening more and more. We also have experienced poor pick-up. Just driving up a hill I could feel the thing trying to get up speed. Anyway we took our van into a mechanic and after about 1 1/2 days they called. They told us they had replaced the cam shaft sensor and the crack shaft sensor and also the fuel filter. I wasn't really happy because I had dropped of the van for a diagnosis and that was supposed to be all, and since no one called to authorize the repairs I was not happy. The bill ran us close to $600 dollars when I was only anticipating $50 for a dianosis. It gets better..... the 2 sensors the replaced and the fuel filter did not even fix the problem! We were informed that our PCM (powertrain control module) needed to be replaced. The quote for the part was $650 plus about 200 for labor!! OMG! Well I couldn't pay that because we just didn't have it and the unexpected repairs drained our bank account to only a few hundred. I looked for the PCM online and found a refurbished unit on ebay for $150. I ordered the part and later that week it came! Chad put the part on himself and it only took 5 mins (Why was the mechanic shop going to charge me $200 for a 5 mins job??!! CRAP!)
I was so disappointed when I test drove the van and it was STILL jerking all over the place! GRRRRR! So all this week we've been trying things like we disconnected the battery and left it all night in hopes it would reset things. No luck. The Chad found a popped fuse and replaced that. Finally today he took it up to O'Riellys and had them do a check engine light test. The 2 codes that came off indicate that we have a large EVAP leak and also the timing is off! Since the PCM didn't fix the problem now I'm wondering if any of the mechanics repairs were necessary? And how in the world could they miss the timing being off? So we bought a new PCM and the old one was probably fine. We paid them $600 to change sensors and a fuel filter when Chad could have done that himself if they would have called first. And now to find out that the other things that were replaced didn't have a thing to do with the jerking in the van makes me absolutely insane!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It wasn't very warm but we still had fun!!

The kids really wanted to try out the new slip and slide Mariah got for her birthday so that's what we did! They froze but it was fun!