Grandma Garden

When we were looking for a house I really wanted a yard where I could construct a rambling flower garden.  Bam!  I landed a half acre, mostly lawn.   I had a vision of etching out several feet from the side of the house around the front, capturing the large shade tree.  It was to be a garden with walking paths in and around interesting things to look at and sniff, something for my grandkids to think back and remember.

So here we have my empty canvas...

But first my husband was hell bent on getting rid of the trees brushing up against the house.  I came home one day and my precious yard looked like THIS

 With the trees out of the way it opened up the side of the house.  There is a natural curve to the terrain that loops around the two stumps and the dogwood further down.

The previous owner did have a patch of iris and day lilies toward the back of the house.  I will eventually transplant them around the rest of the garden, but I have to admit the burst of color this spring was pretty stunning.

 

When we took down the trees we had a TON of wood chips.  Had we gone about this with better planning I would have dug up the grass, laid down a layer of something to block the weeds then pile on the woodchips.  Alas I had to scramble to move the chips into place so they just went on top of grass.  This will pose some very predictable problems later on.

In the front of yard I added stepping stones and a pretty heart plant hanger (found in the garage).  A busy hummingbird feeder and a nearly dead climatis that perked up after planting.

And then came the day Mr Tree Hater proclaimed that the roots are hitting the sewer and the 50 yr old oak tree and pretty shade tree need to come out.  I protested but money talks around here and the sewer line won out.  Dammit.

So in preparation, my mom and I dug up all of the bulbs we had planted a year earlier and moved them closer to the house.

Eventually my garden was "etched"

I ran out of stepping stones...

 And my hand-me-down stand for a bird bath stood without a bowl...

Then the ugly bumpy edging bricks that filled the yard were repurposed and laid on their side (turns out the mower can to over them fairly well.

Notice the huge scar my missing shade tree left behind?

 This spring the bulbs came up, a couple flowered.  The climatis took off like crazy in its new spot

Then my dogwoods bloomed - amazingly the pretty pink one is inside the garden

Oh hey, look we finally got a bowl for the bird bath

And then the grass came in

 It got tall and scraggly

So I spent endless days pulling and yanking grass.  I never did get it all.

Then that stupid climatis decided to die so I hung a fern in the heart.  AND THE DAMN THING CAME BACK TO LIFE.  

My mother-in-law moved and left me all of her bricks.  We laid them out along the side of the house as stepping stones.  This project is not complete, so I will have many more updates.  Just wait to see what we have planned for them.

I took our three tomato pots and filled them with flowers this year.  That was definitely a smart move adding color and archetecture to the garden.  OH, and look at the rocks!  Someone was tearing up their yard and asked if I wanted them - uh YES.

And Dahlia's bloomed!

This is the view from the rear of the house.  The boat definitely makes it a grandma garden - the whole goal for this to be for a place for the kids to wander and play and learn.

Directly behind the house is the rose garden and a "field" of black eyed susans.  They will eventually move around to the side of the house, but not this year.

A week ago we took down yet another tree, but definitely a good idea since it was dying - Look at that hollow stump!  I'm keeping this one and it will be a planter next year.

Last fall's pumpkins (four pie pumpkins and one jack-o-lantern) died a slouchy death on my front porch and their carcasses were escorted unceremoniously to lie in front of the day lilies.  I've enjoyed watching them sprout and now am leading their vines toward the front of the house

 And the grass is coming back

A fun little addition standing watch at the front of the house

 

 I'm having a lot of fun with this garden.  Other chores around the house and the rest of the yard keep me from really putting the time necessary to pull it together, but it's coming along.  I can't wait to see what it does next year!

TIMBER!

Sorry I missed posting yesterday, I overslept.

What I wanted to share was the progress of the yard.   When we moved in last year we knew our tax return this year would go to a new AC and taking down some trees.  Little did I know those checks would be written in the same week!  My hippie friend who does AC work had to tap dance around the biker dude slaughtering our trees, or maybe the other way around.  I was at work and just heard secondhand reports from my husband.  The guys are weird characters but both do excellent work at killer prices.

We had three tall pine trees near the house that dropped needles in the gutters.  I actually liked them and they tossed a lot of afternoon shade on the house, but hubby felt a big storm could be catastrophic.  We also had a very mature sweet gum at the corner of our lot that dropped spiky balls of death.  There was zero love loss in taking this tree down and even the lady across the street was grateful to see it go. 

To keep the prices down we asked that we do the clean up and removal.  I wanted to keep the logs for firewood and chip the limbs for mulch.  When he dropped the trees he cut everything down to the right size for firewood.  My sons and my brother's family came to the rescue to help move all of that timber to reasonable piles and feed the stack of limbs through a chipper shredder.  The exceptionally large logs still need to be split so I will be renting a splitter sometime next week.

I keep rolling through my pictures because I'm sure I have a couple of the yard with the trees standing.  The landscape has totally changed.  I didn't get pictures of the first day when the pine trees came down.  That was a holy mess with green branches sticking up everywhere and made me think of a mass murder, but when the sweet gum was dropped the next week it looked like a tornado ripped through.  And with THAT I have pictures:

My first glimpse coming home

Fifty year old sweet gum.  It was a BIG tree and very dense.

Our woodchip pile

In a few weeks I should have pictures of the new garden and how the yard looks cleaned up.

A Bradford Pear Tree

There happens to be TWO Bradford pear trees in my front yard.  Two.  Sounds lovely, eh?  Not really.

The first problem is that my postage stamp of a front yard receives zero sunlight.  Not doppled or scattered.  Zero.  Dark as a damn dungeon and combined with the washout that occurs with every rain, nothing grows underneath as a result.

This is a view when you look up.  And yes, that would be one of the nine zillion acrobatic squirrels that also reside in my neighborhood.

In case you need a better view of a squirrel...

 

So combine a Bradford pear with those dipshit squirrels and we arrive at the biggest problem - the actual "pears".  I don't know squat about these pear trees.  I always thought given enough time they would eventually produce legitimate fruit.  Instead, they produce tiny bulbs that don't get any bigger than a thumbtack.

Hmmm... "thumbtack" is an apt description.  Because when you step on one barefoot they hurt like hell.

Now the squirrels like to "harvest" the tiny pears.  They don't sit in the tree and pack their little cheeks, oh no, they pluck the pear, toss it to my roof, let it roll down, over the metal awning, TINK TINK TINK TINK, and litter my front walk.

My first year in this house it took me forever to figure out that maddening sound.

This is a picture of my neighbor's house.  It's not nearly as covered as my front walk but I swept before I thought to take a picture.

Bradford Pear season is nearly over.  Soon, as in days, it will be acorn season.  The house on either side of me each has a large, mature oak tree.  Fortunately neither one has a metal shed under their trees, unlike the poor sap at the end of the street.  That sounds exactly like a machine gun.  At six AM.

Sunday In My City - Pine Needles