I picked up extra bricks to raise up Garden #1. My wife and I picked out some plants for the long section. I borrowed a friends truck and bought a ton of soil and picked up a half ton of mulch. I had to dig up the plants that I already had growing so that I could replant them at the new level. After filling up both gardens with dirt we planted and then covered with mulch.

A quick note about the mulch. There is a yard wast dump in my town that anyone can go to and take a load if they want. Mostly it's shredded leafs but today I noticed a pile of finely chopped wood chips. The mound was about 7 feet high and not too tightly compacted. As I got into the pile I found that it had started composting and was quite hot and steamy inside. When I got it back I made sure to add a couple buckets full into my compost pile to see if that would get things moving.

Here are the before pictures:

And after: