Trying out raised bed gardening with a brown thumb

Although I am pretty good with animals, I can't pretend to have any skill with gardening.  Over the winter, my two 4 year old fig trees died in the cold - I know I should have surrounded them in straw, but it somehow slipped my mind.  I planted 6 raspberry bushes, and the 3 remaining bushes look like this:

Embarrassed to say, but this is the best
looking of the 3

So the idea of having a vegetable garden is a bit daunting.  You would think that, living on over nine acres, we would have a garden at least an acre in size.  The best I dare take on at this time is two raised beds, 4ft x 8ft.  If all goes well, we will have zucchini, strawberries, sugar peas, and tomatoes.

I've already made some mistakes.  We built the raised beds and did not even think of the type of lumber - we used treated lumber, which can leach chemicals into the bed.  With the help of my procrastination tendencies, we let them sit out in the elements for 2 years, and I'm told they should now be safe for "above ground" vegetables (but never root veggies).  

I hoed the bottom that was deeply overgrown, then put down year old horse manure covered with 4" of garden soil.  Now I found out that I should have pulled all the grass and weeds that were growing, as they will probably make their way to the surface.  Did I mention I am no good at this gardening stuff?

Anyway, look what popped up this weekend!  Sugar snap peas!  I am so excited!

Can you see them? They are still tiny, but they
are GROWING!

I know that these sugar snap peas need something to grow on, so my father-in-law, my son, Caleb, and I went into the woods and cut swamp grass bamboo and built this:

Grow, dang it!

It is sturdier than it looks, and after clipping the top to prevent the wind from catching, my engineer husband says it should work!  Woo hoo!  I even said a little prayer over the pea sprouts.  I will let you know how they turn out.