May Garden Happenings....

May 13: The fence completion! Patrick finished the gate, removing the old chain link etc. When digging for the post hole he dug out the old downspout diverter which was a molded cement and rock monstrosity. He left it there for meand the sun garden, obviously, had not really had anything done to it since I was waiting for the fence to be completed. Slightly to the left of the apple t...rees (those are columnar sentinal apple trees and there are two parrallel so it looks like one but they are branchless mostly) is a lavender which was split and growing horribly which I have been meaning to remove since last year. Patrick did dig a large plant which was growing where the cement diverted is sitting which we planted in the front yard to give it the room it now requires.

The new fence with lattice Patrick hung for the hops and marrionberries we are planting to grow on. The is where the arbor vitae used to be. I have bags of soil, compost and conditioner to add here and you can see the dwarf trees I am adding here so far: (from left to right) an all in one almond tree, (not shown since it will be relocated from another part of the yard) a dwarf turkish fig (figs self polinate), two dwarf honeycrisp apple trees and two dwarf peach trees. Alreay in the ground are very aggressively growing shasta daisies which always remind me of my mom since they were a favorite of hers.

And Patrick also finished the chicken village, remodeling the old coop which Ben and Nick build and gave to us many moons ago. It now has a super nice new roof, a fresh coat of stain, lots of alterations inside giving them way more space. They seem to love it and do not even complain to be let out immediately in the AM anymore which is pretty awesome.

Before...well, more like right now. You can see the upper corner garden starting to get blocked off - the side yard is a veggie garden away from the chickens which Patrick is covering with lattice so the chickens will not pay attention to it. The rest is my country garden which a few years ago used to be all lawn. This is what the garden looks like at the beginning of the season before I have done a thing to it. The green ground is a varigated ivy, irish moss, spagnum moss and corsican mint - the later three grown wild in my back yard and I encourage due to it's beauty and fragrance. And yes, that is our pond.

The new gate through which you can see Ginger and Delilah. The toppers were found by our next door neighbor Ralph and are solar lights. They were such a great find too - regularly $16 each at $4 on sale!

And here is the gate closed. Patrick had to get a bit creative with the design since our shared driveway is blackop which is poured up to the sun garden. The original chain link fencing was a part of the blacktop.

I only buying annuals for a few of my containers in the yard like these hanging baskets since annuals are drought tolerant usually. I love the Queen of Night petunia variety which came out a few years ago.

Here is the front yard as it currently stands - I swear everything gets bigger every day.

I rescued this sad twig from a friend's blackberry bramble. Now that it is finally growing it actually looks like a rosebush and even shaped itself rather nicely.

From the same friend I rescued a pile of iris which were trying their best to grow under a pine tree. Now they are a centerpiece in my front yard.

The strawberry patch is covered in berries now and the walkway's plants are doing great! I still cannot believe this time last year this was all lawn!

May 22nd: I spent two nights after work revamping the sun garden now that the fence is complete. I cleared the weeds (I am always battling this noxious succulent which tries to strangle out my plants in here) and I moved the downspout diverter to our outbuilding. Instead, Patrick dug out the area adding pebble river rock style gravel. The ground cover is lipstick strawberries which both the chickens and squirrels love. Right in front of the apple trees I removed the broken lavender and replaced it with a new walking... stone. To the left of the apple trees is a column with a new varigated honeysuckle I dare to take over that corner.The delphinium is a new addition and directly next to it is my new lantern stand thanks to the awesome gift card lady J gave me for my birthday to the Backyard Bird Shop. Hanging from it are these great flameless candle holders I was gifted for my birthday from Mike and Derek! I love that my good friends gift me garden stuff - I look around my yard and think of all of you often!See More

I decided to add three new rose bushes against the house - the one on the fence crook is a tall climber. I also put in a large peony which is about to bloom, a curry plant, some new ground cover and a few icelandic poppies.

NEXT! So I am digging out more lawn (that does not grown well anyway) to add an area for our firepit and some more seating. And look...the daisies are blooming! And I decided to add raspberries as well.

Project 365: January 16th through January 22nd

January 16th: For Yule I got some of our family members digital picture frames for a great deal at Best Buy.


I opened them all up clearing out all the packing.


I got really inexpensive SD cards from Ebay which I loaded up with 2 years worth of Project 365 photos. I loaded up the SD cards onto the digital frames so they just needed to be plugged in.


Macha helps me sort through the pages...


I staple the 12 pages together which describe what each day's photo is of.


And Macha continues her help warming the digital frame boxes.


January 17th: SNOW DAY! Or actually night since it melted off as fast as it came in.


January 18th: My new scarf hanger and my scarves all organized.


I found these gorgeous candle holders at Home Goods for cheap to use in my wrought iron sconces. They are greenish with gold.


January 19th: My friend Jemiah's gorgeous and super sweet kitty always hits on me when I visit.


January 20th: Soup party at Dana and Seth's. While playing card games I laughed looking at the floor and seeing how the twins have decorated their parent's house.


January 21st: Heading out to Sunday's birthday party I packed her present up and topped it with some rosemary from the garden.


January 22nd: 1am at the Rocky Horror Picture Show with Robert, Kandice and Kevin.

Project 365: September 12th through September 18th

September 12th: Moonviewing at the Portland Japanese Garden.


September 13th: Francesca and Ginger hard at work.


September 14th: We have a baby fig!


September 15th: The strawberry patch has been moved to the front now.


September 16th: One of our anniversary dinners.


September 17th: The front garden is doing rather well.


September 18th: The new additions...Hens and Chicks 'Lola', Peppermint, Ornamental Pepper 'Purple Flash', Southern Yellow Lupine, White Star Creeper, English Thyme, Bluebeard Spirea, Tiny Buttons, Bee-Balm 'Panorama Red Shades', Ceum 'Lady Stratheden', Stevia, Hyssop 'Sunset', Aster, and Hyssop 'Apricot Sunrise'.


And new walkway to the faucet.

August Garden Updates

And here is an update on our fencing and front yard projects...

July 30th :Finishing adding the flagstone and getting the sides ready to till for a final time.




The guys power washing the moss from our roof - notice the VERY distinctive difference between the moss covered left side of the roof and the newly cleaned right side of the roof.


And the finished roof...thanks guys!


Planting and trimming...




Finished planting the pathway.
















And the list of new plants I added: Two found rose bush starts (seedlings from four bushes that were on the side of the house several years ago I gave to Bronwyn and Mike when we put in the chicken pen), 2 Chandler Blueberry bushes, 2 Early Girl Cherry Tomato, Japanese Cucumber (which may or may not make it), Wine Cape Fuchsia (Perennial variety), German Winter Thyme (which may not make it), Lobelia (another one which might not make it - a few of these REALLY did not like being in the sun and in containers no matter how much water we gave them), Variegated Oregano (another which is half dead), Heavenly Blue Lithadora (one of the best ground covers seriously - will take full sun to partial shade and grows like crazy), Edge of Night Calle Lily, Russian Sage (another which was hurting bad and might not make it), Variegated Lemon Thyme, Barbecue Rosemary, Pineapple Mint, Coreopsis Big Bang Cosmic Eye, Speedwell Fairytale (I am hoping this makes it as well - Speedwell usually is pretty good about that), Bougainvillea - Barbara Karst (which is one Patrick picked out and is a vine style I planted right at the corner of the house for some gorgeous fuchsia color), Ceanothus l. Dark Star, Holly Blue Prince and Princess (one of each - which again, Patrick picked out - he has a HUGE thing for Holly, Moonshadow Euonymus, Twickle Purple Lavender (another which is not doing so hot I can hopefully nurse back), Husky Cherry Tomato, 2 Cannas (which I would not have bought if I had seen them listed as an annual - I thought they were a perennial), White Star Creeper (planted around the flag stones for walk-able ground cover), Baby's Tears (planted around the flag stones for walk-able ground cover), Japanese maple start (Acer Palmatum), Myoporum White, Bee Balm (which is REALLY doing amazing!), Stonecrop (planted around the flag stones for walk-able ground cover), blue hydrangea (which was a birthday present from Beth Adams and is doing amazingly well - so I have Cape Cod reminders in my front and back yard which is awesome), Varigated Vinca, and two Oriental Lily bulbs for Patrick since they are his absolute favorites.


July 30th: Adding the second fence section...




August 4: And the fence soldiers on! The third section is in and level. The next section requires beginning the demo of the neighbor's old fence and they are out of town right now so we are waiting until they get back since he had plans for the old fence sections. We want to make sure to take it down correctly etc. But so far the fence is looking pretty awesome! The chunk of concrete and tree trunk with chain link in its center were hauled off late last night as well.


Bees! One of my favorite things about having mint strategically placed throughout my yard (since I collect it out of love) is that it attracts bees something fierce which is great for everything else as well. Here we see a honey bee enjoying some apple mint.


Squirrels eat bulbs something crazy and Christina Griffith gave me an insane amount of gladiola bulbs a few years back when her front yard was getting shredded. I am happy a few survived the squirrel's feast because they really are quite lovely.




This is the year for apples! Our Columnar Sentinal apple trees are fierce this year with fruit! This is just a small section of one of the trees to give you an idea!


These started coming up near the fountain and are quite lovely with the body of a cosmo and the flowers of a delphinium but I have not a clue what they are or when I planted them!


Our grape harvest this year should be grand as well. Everyone keeps thoroughly admiring the arbor which really does look stunning.