The Design Comes Alive

It seems the best time for blogging is the winter. Cold nights lend themselves to dreaming in flowers. But the beauty of the garden right now is just crying out to blogged about. One way I experience God's love is through beauty. He may not have planted with His own hands or played the instrument, or caused the child to laugh (or did He...?), but he gave us the senses to experience it, the capacity to be filled by it, and the commensurate longing for it. This evening in the garden left me full and longing at the same time. Thank you, Father!
One of the goals of this garden design was to be easy to see in the evening, since that's when I have time to enjoy it. In the jargon of the web: Epic Win!

Today in the Garden

The Genius of Farmers

A few weeks ago we went to an estate sale down the road and picked up a push broom, a shovel, and a hoe (as well as the yellow bowl in the pool garden). Woohoo! I don't ever remember using a hoe. My clearest memory having anything to do with a hoe is freshman year of college there was a one outside at a class (Why? No clue.). Its amazing how many jokes can be made about a dirty old hoe.

While my perennials are enjoying Spring and getting lush and happy, bajillions of malicious plants are being born every second. Its pretty disheartening. So I thought about picking up the hoe, but you know what stopped me? Embarrassment! I'm a flower gardener, not a farmer! What will people think of me, hoeing my perennials? But, like with my new gardenning hat, I threw vanity to the wind and hoed my row...of tiarella cordifolia.

Farmers are geniuses. The tiny baby weeds are easily scraped off the surface and biggers ones are hacked out with the corners. How supremely satisfying! And totally worth the plebian feeling. Thanks farmers!

Today in the Garden

The yellow bowl is a Corelleware one that I found at an estate sale this weekend. I stuck it in a tomato cage and it looks pretty good. Not high art, but I like it (for now).
Pulmonaria 'Sissinghurst White" in bloom.

Pulsatilla Vulgaris, or pasque flower, drooping after the rain.

I want to be awesome--like people who give away manure for free

I prepared the middle bed for planting last weekend. I was planning on buying what I needed: compost, topsoil, potting soil, and mulch. Well, Friday night I was browsing Craigslist and found someone who was giving away composted manure just a 25 minute drive away. I decided to give it a try. Of course, the books I read say to get all soil amendments from a  reputable source (read: expensive) so that there are no weeds and other bad actors in them. Impossible, I say! Nothing I have ever purchased for my garden has ever come free of weeds. I put it down, give it some water, and, Bam. Weeds. I feel anything is worth trying once--and its free!

I asked them why they were giving it away and they said, "So we don't have to spread it." Ok, but there are others on Craigslist who are charging. For example, $20/truckload, or the carpetbagger on the East side who is charging $20/bushel basket. And these fine people were not ignorant of the market. We all laughed openly at the bushel-basket-guy. No, they just wanted it get rid of it and do it for free. Not only that, he shoveled it into sturdy feed bags and loaded up my poor Camry's trunk. I shudder to think of what would have happened if I had used my wimpy garbage bags. Meanwhile we chatted about everything and I learned that they've been fostering special needs kids for 23 years. 

That's the kind of awesome I want to be: willing to give, willing to serve, willing  to love.

Site Log II

I find that now I have revealed all my garden areas in my site log, I have less motivation to show my non-garden areas. Well, potential-garden areas, actually.. I think if we live in this house for too many more years, it will only be a massive, rambling garden. I like the sound of that...

Next on the log is the back border. There are some hostas, daylillies, brunnera, and maiden's rocket (who came up with that name?) here. I'm not sure what's mine and what's the neighbors.

Then comes the right side which has several lilacs, a rampant and contrary forsythia, and a rose that-from the height it reaches- would like to be growing up a trellis.



Next is the pine area, which is Marma's favorite hang-out spot. It was also the site of a carefully fought battle against poison ivy (My arch nemesis. There are weeds that I despise, but only p.i. can hurt me back). So far, I am The Winnah. In this area are lilly of the valley, really big violets, rhododendrons, rose of sharon, a very unhappy holly, pachysandra (ugh), tons of baby maple trees, and all the pinecones we throw back at the trees that shed them. All of these plants were here when we arrived. This is not my favorite place, but Marma likes it,, so I'm not messing with it

Site Log

We finally got a digital camera, which I resisted because I'm an old fuddy-duddy. What convinced me was my desire to keep a log of sun and shade patterns in the yard so I can plan gardens better. So I started the log this weekend. Its tricky since I need everything to line up: A sunny day on the weekend when I'm home. ideally, I want to take a picture every hour of daylight several times during each season. I only got three time-points in this weekend. On the left is the pool garden, of course, with a fresh top-dressing of home-made compost!

Next is the area to the left of the pool garden when looking towards the back.There are hosta,
violets, little white flowers that smell like chamomile, and weeds here.
The trees get tons of white flowers in the late Spring. I wish I knew what it is.

On the left again is the Middle Bed, which I will be working on this Spring. The shape is blobbish and I don't know If I can improve on it much. I lack imagination.

Then there's the Back Bed (and the compost pile). This is the first garden I planted. I plan on edging it this Spring--its been shrinking steadily.

There's more to come. And don't worry, I won't bore you with all the raw data, just the occasional garden tour through the seasons.