I'm near Houston, Texas. It just didn't seem to get that cold for very long this year (maybe 14 days over the course of the whole winter and definitely not strung together).
I used pressure treated lumber before I realized the dangers of it. I would highly reccommend using something else. If I weren't selling this house I would take the beds down and either use cedar or masonry of some sort.
We have termites in this area really bad as well.
When we put in the beds we had a dumptruck of "garden soil" dumped and we filled the bed with this. It turned out to be topsoil with manure that wasn't composted enough for my liking. We've had the bed for 3 years now and every year we have put in more compost in the beds and quite a bit of it too. I think the top several inches of soil is actually pure compost.
This was our first year to grow cabbage. We use them to make smoothies. I love the fact that my 3 year old loves to go into the garden and hunt for things he can eat. He loves banana peppers straight off the vine when he can get them. I have to watch him when the strawberries are in season because he will pick them and eat them green.
We used 2X12's and 4X4's. We cut the 4X4 posts to the width of twice the demension of the width of the boards used (in other words we measured the width of the board so it ended up that we cut the 4X4's a little shy of 24 inches long). You need to cut 4 of these. posts. Then cut the 2X12's to whatever length you want the beds to be. But I would advise not making the beds more than 3 feet across so you don't have to climb in the beds to reach stuff. So youwill need 4 boards cut to 3 feet and 4 boards cut to whatever length you decide. Then just use galvenized screws to screw the 2X12's into the 4X4's making a box (remember that you are stacking these 2 boards high). Oh and its easier to build them in place rather than moving them after the fact, but if you have to build them in one area then move them later on, it can be done just enlist help. When you have them in place, you can put leaves down in the bottom or just fill with good compost. And plant away. Oh and one hint that I haven't done myself buy I've heard works well is that if you have a slug problem, buy some copper tape (like the kind used when making stained glass) and put around the top board. The slugs can't cross it.
Originally posted by tinkgirl thanks.....what type of wood should i use?
We just used cheap untreated pine from Home Depot. When it started to rot, we would just lay it down between the raised beds and let it break down into mulch/path material.
Oh, and to make a link from an attachment, do the following:
1. upload the attachment and submit the post.
2. go to your post, right click the attachment and select copy link location.
3. edit your post and use the [img] tags (for this example, i'm using brackets):
{img}paste link location here{/img}
4. resubmit the post
And you get:
__________________
Barbara
Mama to the Amazing Avner
What a lovely garden Thank you for sharing your pictures.
Cherry...did you put anything down between the raised planters? I hate weeds and my ground is clay, which is difficult to dig up. I would like to do what you have done. I had a smaller version of a raised bed, but the wood rotted quickly and the bed was full of weeds. I had laid newspaper down which helped a little.
I have noticed that the herbs like to take over a garden quickly, so they would be best in raised contained areas. I made the mistake of mixing the herbs in with my flowers and now it is a mess...more of a naturalized area., if anything.
__________________ *~Gail~*& Miss Elizabeth
Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth ~1 John 3:18
Well we made our beds so close together that its really hard to mow between (not that we wanted to anyway). So we first put down newsprint (tons of it), then we put down a TON of mulched leaves. Then every year we put down more mulched leaves (and newprint if an area needs it). It pretty much keeps the weeds down. I do have to weed the pathways from time to time but not nearly as often as you would think. We put as much as 4-6 inches of mulched leaves down each year. We have heavy clay soil too, that's why we chose raised beds. Oh if you decide to have mint in your herb beds, I would HIGHLY reccommend a seperate mint bed for each mint that is what we did. Mint spreads FAST and will take over a bed. We actually have 4 mint beds: Peppermint, Spearmint, Applemint and Chocolate mint. Then we have 2 pots with Orange Mint and (oh heck I can't remember the other one right now). Its funny we put the mints in beds that weren't 2 boards high like the rest of the garden so now we have mint in our yard. If you have really stubborn weeds you can't have enough layers of newprint down before you put down mulch. We used leaves because they were free. Can you believe all our neighbors were just throwing away all this free mulch, LOL. We just went and gathered all of their bags of leaves, mulched them then put them in our garden paths. In the summertime, some of our neighbors also bag their lawn clippings after they mow, so we will take those and put them down in the path ways also. It keeps the weeds at bay for the most part. We still do get weeds, but they are easer to pull when its just one or 2.
I need to plant some peppermint...I hear that ants do not like the scent
I have coriander, I think that is what it is, and it has taken over the one area of the garden. Thyme too, but at least that is low growing and chokes out the weeds.
The one thing I am struggling with to grow is lavender. I have not had any luck and it is my favorite plant. I want to line my walk way path with it...
My Garden Yesterday
Thank you for sharing your pictures. 
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