Repurposing in my Garden

An old bedroom lamp meets a broken solar light and we have a light in our sitting area at night. I saw this idea 'on Facebook' ;)

Note the other repurposed item above - the stem snapped off a glass goblet and Kelly put it to good use holding some sedum.

I'd been hanging onto an old brass headboard for years. Many times Kelly tried to put it to the curb when cleaning out the garage. It finally found a spot at the back of the yard. Aside from supporting a clematis, it also blocks the deer from coming through.

One other thing we repurposed a few years ago still supports our Halls honeysuckle. We had new neighbours who were getting rid of old iron railings... so I grabbed them. We have a fake stairway to nowhere against the garage.

The Bird Sanctuary

The Bird Sanctuary is the area of my garden that is the sideyard we view out our dining room and kitchen windows. The sideyard is divided in half by a fence which separates the front sideyard from the back sideyard. Only the part of the sideyard that is in the front is the Bird Sanctuary.

It is full of trees that block all the sun. It is impossible to grow anything but woodland plants here and even some of them struggle. Every year, we talk about pruning to open up the sunlight just a little. Every year we cut some, nature breaks some and we pick up branches on a daily basis. None of it makes a difference to the lack of light.

There are two Spirea 'Snowmound' in here, a Ninebark and a sad, sad, lilac. The old light purple, highly scented variety of lilac which was, at one time, a very healthy shrub. This year it had about 20 flowers and 6 leaves. It struggles the most and if it is to be saved, we will need to help it this year. I am almost certain it will not make another.

The birds give me an excuse to let the whole place go a little wild and it always does. Plants find it difficult, weeds seem to love it. I still fight the good fight. Trying to find the plants that will live here. So far there are hosta and columbine. Siberian Iris 'Moonsilk' was here until this year. It never blooms. I moved it this year.

Despite all of this, I will never move the feeders and baths from this area. The birds love the tree cover. They all come in huge numbers providing hours of free entertainment and very occasionally, something rare will stop. Plants are here... but the birds are the focus.

No Stopping

After all my years of gardening in Saskatchewan, the one thing I know for sure is that there is no stopping winter from arriving. This is the time of year that the timing of the snow keeps me on my toes. The saddest day of the year in my garden is the day I have to bring in all my garden art, which includes the sun stone and little squirrel sundial above. Anything that is not made of concrete, is super strong or too heavy to lift will be either brought into the house or put in the shop. It is a long day of heavy work to put it all away and the consequences of missing something are not much fun either. I lost a Mexican sunbaked tile by forgetting it out all winter. It was a gift from a friend and very disappointing to lose. Once the job is done, the garden will look very bare until the snow covers it. As a result, I try to leave it to the last possible day. Everything glass came inside today because the nights are getting cold. Everything else has been left out so far. I am keeping my eye on the forecast though. If I wait until the snow actually falls, it will be a cold, wet job as well and that usually leads to my first cold of the season. I try to avoid that scenario but my desire to stretch the season often leaves me wet and cold... whether it is planting last minute bulbs or moving things inside. It is hard to let go of the garden for our long winters. Often, I am glad to see the snow in late fall, being in need of a break. Always, I am ready for spring well before it arrives!

Good Hair Day

I was born with bone straight, very fine hair. The kind of hair that it is hard to find a hair dresser that knows what to do with it. The lifetime result of that is that my hair is always straight and either shoulder length or longer because for the last ten years I have had the same hair routine. Every summer when the weather gets really hot, I pull it all into a ponytail and then cut that off. It grows the rest of the year until I get too hot in the garden again and repeat the procedure. I think my skills as a garden hair dresser are far more impressive. This year, our pothead Gnome has three types of sedum for hair. I like this planting better than any other she has had since she arrived. Miles is more fond of her when I plant decorative grasses but I love the way the sedum sits along her forehead and fills outward and upward giving the impression that she has spent some time making herself look her best. Perhaps heading to a Saturday night barn dance. I think she is going to look even better when the flowers open.

The Love Bus

This is our Love Bus, eventhough it is a van, and it is probably my favourite piece of garden art. It is certainly the single piece we invested the most in. It was one of those things that we just fell in love with when we first saw it and there was no way I wasn't taking it home. Actually, though, it was delivered because it is concrete, very heavy and did not fit in our car. The two boys that delivered it were not happy to find that I wanted them to put it in the farthest corner of the yard from the gate. That was when we lived in the city. The movers brought it here for us and it was much easier to place up by the back deck in Benedict's Upper Level Garden. I love the little peace sign rims and the yin yang bubble window. The other side says Flower Power in bright coloured paint on raised letters. Until this year, I have always grown impatiens in it but this year I grew my new Begonia 'Golden Wave' inside. If they survive the winter, I will repeat that next year because it was quite stunning. The Love Bus also has a roof that sits on top of it in the Winter. I usually fill it with leaves to replenish the soil and cover it until Spring. I used to make a table out of the roof for the Summer, using bricks as the legs, but because it has raised flowers and a bigger peace sign on it, it was not the easiest table to set a cup of coffee on. So in recent years, I just lean it somewhere in the garden. Usually on the opposite side of The Gecko at the same stump. In the front of the bus, there is a personalized license plate with the artist's name, C. Johnston, carved into the concrete. Although we ate peanut butter sandwiches for a month to buy it, I have never regretted the purchase. We have had it since 1996, it has always lived outdoors and shows no signs of fading. Well worth the brief sacrifice!

The Gecko

This is our Gecko. He lives in Benedict's Upper Level Garden and he likes to keep his eyes on Benedict at all times. I don't think he likes the horns. Eventhough he never quite makes it to the top of the stump, he seems very happy hanging off its' side. He is kept company by the Hummingbirds that visit the Honeysuckle and the occasional cat that sits atop the stump. That happens more in the Summer than in the Winter. For a thin metal figure, he has held up surprisingly well in the outdoors year round.

Benedict

Garden art is very important in my garden. I consider everything that isn't a plant, from containers to bird baths, as garden art. Even when the bird bath has a stump or rock for a base. This is Benedict sharing a view with our cat, Jake. Benedict is our sentinel and sits at the top of the stepping stone steps, facing the drive where he can watch the road and be the first to see visitors approaching. He is so special, he has his own garden. Benedict's Garden extends from where he sits back to the fence on both the upper and lower levels. In front of his lower level is the Nursery and behind the fence on his upper level is the Bird Sanctuary. This area used to be known as the sideyard but Benedict's Garden has stuck since he moved in. In his garden, Benedict has tulips, delphinium, fern, anemone, bergenia and always begonia. You wouldn't know it to look at him but Benedict loves flowers. When we first got Benedict, Wile E. used to bark at him constantly, especially at night. I think Wile E. wondered why Benedict never want to play... or answer. Eventually he figured it out. I do the same thing. I find myself talking to him out there as much as I talk to the dogs. He has a personality for me. Although I doubt anyone else would notice it.