A Retrospective. 1. The Front and Back Yards, 2007-2014

In some ways: so much changed!
In others, not so much.

Makeovers inside the house tend to be decorative in nature, low budget and somewhat easily changed.

Changes made outside, though, tend to take much longer (sometimes several years) and are somewhat more permanent. They also tend to be done by my husband!

However, there are a lot of pictures--and it may take a while to get through the whole post. I advise a good beverage.

Weekend Project: Flower pots.

Spring!

I didn't get a whole lot done this weekend. Our hot water tank started leaking Thursday night and had to be replaced--fortunately we found someone to come on Friday and install a new one. The old one was 19 years old.

So we're rebuilding our emergency fund.
I didn't feel comfortable putting on my painting clothes and finishing any projects on Friday. Saturday was busy with Girl Guides during the day and Scouts in the evening, but I did manage one small project on Sunday:

taken last night, in the evening sun

The tall grassy thing is Dracenea, the yellow flowers are pansies, and the trailing plant should be lobelia. I also put in a few white Alyssum plants just because I like them.

taken today, in the noon time shade

I did two: one for either side of the steps:

Pleasant enough.
(Those are extra pansies on the steps. I think I'll return them.)

The View From Here

the dining room window (taken yesterday)

and here:

the living room window (also taken yesterday)

is dismal.

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you will know that I have been wrestling with landscaping my yard since the summer of 2008.

The way things were.

I planted a Mock Orange and a Hydrangea near the house this year: I think both have died.

I found this fabulous web-site by a visionary landscape designer/garden planner which I know Anne will love. The blog is called Vanishing Threshold and its author is Tara Dillard.

She believes in creating views to be seen from the house, establishing a diverse habitat in the lawn to maximize pollination, using shot pea gravel and not using foundation plants. (Which is perfect for me--have I mentioned my Hydrangea and the Mock Orange? How about the Dogwood I planted the year before last which is barely hanging on?)

She posted this image of a garden and it instantly captivated me.

from The New York Times. photographer: Randy Harris.

No surprise, I've been up to the wee hours of the morning planning my front yard.



This centre box would be planted with hellebores, ferns and hostas. (One of Tara's Trinities.)

Can you imagine it?

I can. And it is the first time I have had something captivate my imagination so completely I can see it almost right down to the last detail. Almost.

Remember Spring? I want to hit the ground running next year.

Pro: I may already have the materials I need for the centre planter box. We have old railroad ties waiting by the side of the house.

Pro: I get to rip up that sidewalk.

Pro: It's not a big planting area. I just may be able to take care of the small number of plants this requires.

Pro: I love the idea of a partial "tapestry" hedge. Moving my shrubs out to the front would not only give me a gorgeous view of them from my front windows but it might save their lives. Have I mentioned the Dogwood, Hydrangea and Mock Orange?

Pro: This plan allows me to expand. If I want to plant sedums or rudebekias or pupera or phlox or grass even another Thuja in the corners I can.

Pro: I fell in love with gates, recently.

Pro: It will hide the foundation--without planting up against it.

Con: I may get really annoyed with having to skirt around the centre "plant island."

Con: I need a focal point. I don't want to spend a ton of money, yet I want something tall and architectural.

Con: Boxwood doesn't do well here.

Con: I really don't know what to do about that flagpole.

Con: This plan may be altogether too formal for my modest little house.

From the street sidewalk, opposite the front door, taken today. Just look at that wonky sidewalk--I mean, what else is there to look at? (sigh).

Container Gardning Part 2

It all started with a trip to Home Despot to check out their sale on bathroom tile.

Honest it did.

They had racks and racks and racks of garden plants--just in! And I found an enthusiastic woman who was thrilled to help me assemble an assortment for my shady front yard. Here's what I got:



4 dracenea --for height.
2 fuchsia --bright pink with purple insides. My daughter wanted them.
2 osteospermum --the daisy-like things with dark purple centres. I love them.
2 potato vines-- just because.
2 calibrachoa --small, bright green with small purple flowers to hang down the sides of the pot.

But before I planted them into my pots, I needed to know where to position the pots.

Let's see. Here?

rather underwhelming, don't you think?

I wanted the UP. I needed height, so I tracked down these old zinc washtubs I bought eons ago.

just misses being symmetrical. hate that.

Hmm, what about here?



I liked it.

Actually, looking at it again, now, I love it! It hides the mess we made of the walk way when we tore it up a couple of years ago and the down spouts are less visible, too.

But I wasn't sure it didn't look sort of silly. So, I left things like that until hubby cam home. He laughed.

So, I went for the simple, the honest, the true: planters at the foot of the stairs.

I bought some potting soil. Thrifty Decor Chick told me to "look for the cheap" potting soil--so I did. It took a while, actually, but I found some stuff at $2.99 for a big bag. The next cheapest potting soil was $7.99 Quite the difference!

As I was putting together the planter, I followed another bit of Thrifty Decor Chicks bits of advice: turn pots the plants came in upside down inside the pot to take up some of that space! It also makes the pots themselves lighter and thus easier to move.


So, I planted away in 40 to 60 km/hour winds last night. (Ok, mostly 40.)

This was my planting "station" set-up.

This morning, I had this:

zero impact. taken at about 8:30am this morning.

and this:



Did I miss something? They just look like plants stuck in a pot to me.

Are there too many plants?
Have I put them in the wrong spots?
Do I need different pots?
Or is this just the way things look at the beginning?

I know you can help me.

Please?UPDATE: Really, the problem isn't my pots, is it? It's the fact that there are no plants in the front, there. I have been researching my options for shrubs in this shady spot. I've decided that mock orange--or philadelphus lewisii 'Blizzard" is a shrub that will work--and a local nursery has one! I'm so excited. Hopefully, I can purchase that tonight and get it into the ground tomorrow. I'd also like to try actaea racemosa or Bugbane on the west side of those steps.

Boom Da Da Boom

The husband has completed re-routing the eavestroughing at the front door. Here it is as of yesterday:



Just for fun, let's compare that to the front door which greeted us when we returned from vacation in late May, shall we?

(The eavestroughing on the right ran down the trunk of that tree, the left didn't function well at all.)

I'd still like a new light fixture--and figure out a more satisfactory solution for the abysmal house numbers. Any thoughts?

Just a Small Project

No more soggy mail!
(The original one had lost its lid.)

Did you know the centre of my house is the mailbox--more or less? Crazy.

Who wants to make the mail box the focal point?

Now, for the light fixture. I'd like to either replace or repaint the one we have. If I could find a more attractive (and suitable) fixture for about the cost of a can of spray paint, I'll do it in a heartbeat! I'd want something plain--but somehow tied into the lovely trellis work. You can't see it, but the window in the front door is a simple diamond. A very simple arts and crafts style would be nice--or would it be too arts and crafts? I haven't a clue. But the current "carriage" style doesn't say anything nice (on my house. It'd be fine somewhere else, I'm sure.)

I went Windows shopping. Here's one from Home despot:



And here's one from our other Big Box store, Rona.

A bit ornate for my taste...but it has a diamond and the scrolly curves of the trellis. I would like it better if the face plate were square. I use compact fluorescent outside, so the frosted glass of the first one is preferable. I like this one, too (also from Rona) but the clear glass gives me pause:


(However, it is only $12!)

I seem to have lost all confidence when it comes to taste. Which one do you like?

Progress Report

I'm afraid this gardening thing has been all-consuming. I imagine it would be fairly boring to anyone not similarly obsessed, so I haven't been posting much. However, some small progress has been made!

1) We've started ripping out the sidewalk that runs in front of the dining room window. After taking down the tree, it was very obvious the whole thing was heaved and sloping back towards the house.
Before:


The husband just wanted to "see" how easy it would be to remove it. This is what was accomplished after we took turns going at it with a sledgehammer and a crowbar for a few hours.

(Aurelia's job was to collect the small stones which fell out of the rubble and stockpile them for me.)

This is where we are now:


The whole project had me in a panic for a few days. We must have a path (or "access") leading round to the side of the house here for the meter reader. The city recently extracted all the gas meters and placed them outside our houses. I'm thinking of creating a gravel path--but I'm not entirely sure just where, yet. And I realised that as long as there is access and something shoveled in winter, I don't need to decide its precise location just yet. That's good, because I still don't know what I'm doing!

2) I'd say "we" but I'm really not helping with this at all--the husband and Caius are in the process of removing my strange front bed--the wooden edgings to be precise.

Here's a "before"--looking at it from the front door, out to the street.



Here's what they've managed to take out so far. Those are 4x6 and 4x4 foot posts, bolted together.

There's about a third of it yet to go. Not sure what we'll use the wood for.

I've applied herbicide to all the vegetation and now I need to cut it down.

It really isn't much, but it's hard physical work, so I guess it can't go any faster than our aging backs and muscles allow.

Oh, 3) I did get this tiny section of fence painted!



In case you think it still looks pretty goldy, (as I do) here's a comparison:

That's it for now.

Never Before Seen...

....on my dining room floor. Light, that is. Natural light. From the sun.

First, a photo from earlier this month.



The next is from this morning, after the husband has pruned off most of the branches. Yes, that is a weird "top" to the tree--as in--there wasn't any! It had been cut off years and years ago.



He took a break and then pruned a few more. We attached a rope near the top.



I can't believe I didn't get a shot of the 1/2 hacked, chopped trunk. Can you believe he went at it with a kindling axe? The blade is no more than 4" wide. But I was scared 1/2 to death from the moment he hit the heartwood--too scared to think of the camera.

We tugged at the rope a few times, then he chopped, I tugged, he chopped, tug, chop, tug, chop, until finally, it was time to call the boy to help us. A few knots in the rope gave us a good grip. There was a CRACK and....



And so, at last, one very tired husband enjoyed the westerning sun on the stoop for the very first time.



One heck uva good day's work.

The Front

Thanks to Anne for asking! I am betwixt and between about all of this--the trees and the shrubs. Thanks to Lorijo for calling my house cute. Later, I plan to photograph the neighbours' houses and give you all an idea of the neighbourhood.

I have no idea what any of this green stuff is called. Help on that front would be great, too.

I tried to do a panoramic, but it didn't work.
So, from left to right, there are two deciduous shrubs, (I believe one is an offshoot of the other), an evergreen shrub, and a tree on either side of the front door.

Here we have the two deciduous shrubs on the left that Anne thought didn't look well:




And here's a close up of both of them:
(Sorry the pics are so bad!)

Then, we have the evergreen shrub and the tree behind it:



Of all the plantings at the front, the shrub is the one I am most attached to, if only because this is the view from the front door.



That of course leaves the tree behind it a bit bare:


On the right side of the front entry, we have yet another evergreen tree. It's been pruned in an unfortunate way, however.


And so, there we have it.

The deciduous shrubs can go...perhaps somewhere else? They are far too delicate to balance out the the rest of the growth. I am often tempted to take down the two trees but I'm genuinely worried about the cold. As this facade faces North, my feeling is they keep the house warm. As well, as the trees cover the front entryway, they do provide some shelter--as the inadequate "porch roof" thingy does not. See it up there above the proch railing "trellis-like" supports? I have no idea who thought that was useful!

This was taken yesterday, when it was sunny. Consider this your "before" picture!
I had planned to ignore the whole thing, just because I don't know what to do, and just work on the lawn (such as it is), but perhpas I really should make up my mind about it!
Advice? Thoughts?