Centerpiece

This year we got to pruning, trimming and cleaning up the centerpiece, vastly improving our view from the house. Before we did that, it looked like one great big tree that grew to the ground instead of three trees and a shrub. What I didn't discover until we were done is that it vastly improved the views from the centerpiece itself. The Elderberry really gave us a show.

The corner of the boardwalk

The Boardwalk Garden has always had its' challenges. When we moved in, it was totally shade from trees overhead. Slowly, we have opened it up a bit but the reality is that we are not willing to remove the trees from around the house. They are what keeps the house protected from the weather and, importantly, cool in the summer! So it still remains, largely a full shade garden.

They don't actually mean full shade when they label plants full shade. Because to a plant, and consequently to a gardener, full shade really means 'not much sun'. There is an expectation that there will always be some sun. Its like blue meaning purple in flower talk. You can't overthink it or it will drive you nuts. Finding plants that will grow in this garden has been a long journey full of dead plants.

The second challenge is our pets. Both cats and dogs alike love this garden. The cats love it for the large patch of catmint just off the deck. They roll in it a lot. The patch always seems to survive them but some years, it is a pretty flat patch in the middle. The dogs love it for the shade. There are lots of places to lay with the sideyard adjacent to the garden and the boardwalk on the other side but they love laying in the cool earth. Or should I say, laying in the hole they have dug in the cool earth. There are parts of this garden I have surrendered to the dogs. Not bothering to plant there anymore.

Another difficulty is that dogs always take the shortest path to the target and when they lay in the shady sideyard and a vehicle pulls in, the shortest path is directly through this garden. I have still not decided if I will continue to leave this path unplanted or if I am going to try and build some sort of tall-ish barrier to discourage them. I will probably follow their cue and take the path of least resistance. The path is likely here to stay, I do not want a dog with a broken leg and that is always the danger with a tall-ish barrier - you run the risk they try to jump.

Hosta, Lady Slipper and of course, Lamium, do well here. Last year I tried Columbine. This year they are the saddest looking Columbine I have ever seen. I will move them. Add hosta in spots and try something else. Coral Bells did not work either but I have been trying to persist with one specimen. This is the year, though, that I take pity on her and give her a happier home. Not sure where I will move her to yet but her bags are packed and she is just waiting for me to find her a little bit more sun and maybe a little less damp.

Which brings me to the final challenge in this garden. It is always damp. It never dries out completely. It is a raised bed garden that was built by the previous owner and filled with garden soil, surrounded by rock in a full shade setting. It wicks up water and hangs onto it forever... and a day. It is why the dogs like to dig sleeping holes in it. Summer afternoons, you can count on at least two of them sleeping here.

Leading the Eye

I love the long view in any garden. Places where I can look through and see everything beyond the garden. In some places in our yard, this occurs naturally. We have one at the back of the yard, as you come around to the secret garden on the road. The opening to the Campground from the secret garden creates a long view of both of those yards. How much you can see depends on where you are standing but always, your eye is drawn to that opening in the bush. Although I am years from planting here, we named it the secret garden because when I look at it, I see all the flowers. I know just where everything is going to be and am pretty sure I know what the gate will look like.

Because our yard is mostly flat, we usually have to create these long views. Looking through the roses at the slide is one place we have done that successfully. The plants here are all mature, the view is set.

Our next manufactured long view will be out where the sun circles are. The roses planted to the sides they face each other are both climbing roses. Miles and I are going to build a willow arbour here for them to climb. Coupled with the lilies, dogwood and ninebark, the rose arbour will create a view that draws the eye down the longest part of the yard, no matter which side you are looking from.

Although it doesn't look quite like that now, in my head, I see it all!

The Shop Sideyard

 

We knew the shop had a big sideyard. There has always been a red shed in the overgrowth there and we could see remnants of it being a working yard. Our plan has always been to clear it and use it as a working yard for all of our groundskeeping needs. We always have a pile of rock, a pile of soil, a huge compost pile of yard debris, piles of branches at different stages of drying... things that now reside all over but would be handy to have in one spot. This is the year we get that done!

Miles has cleared out half of the yard already. The rolls of fencing and wire from the front of the shop are now stored on and under the rack at the side of the red shed. The compost and branch piles are started at the bush edge. It is all very exciting!

Birds in My Garden

We have a bird sanctuary section of our garden that is full of bird feeders, baths and shrubs they can perch in. Our cats know better than to hunt birds but occasionally, we have to remind them. Our bird sanctuary is full of birds of many types throughout the day. It is not the only place you can find birds here though.

Cliff Swallows move in at the shop every year to have babies. Some years they are greater in number than others. This year, there are a good number of them but we have never seen as many as arrived to welcome us the first year we lived here. They were building 3 nests deep that year!

And not all of my birds can fly. But all are just as engaging as I walk through the garden :)

Backyard Views

The back yard has gone through the most changes since we first arrived here. The day we moved in, the middle section was a big, dead circle that had been sprayed with roundup to create a turn around for the school bus. A turnaround that the school bus could not get to through the bush.

It then became a much larger garden than it is today. We built the firepit and my intent was to build a quarter moon shaped garden around the edge of the middle section. That was almost complete when we thought we were going to move. The real estate agent thought the garden might be too big so it was dug out until there was just a small border garden along the parking area of the drive.

Now, I just plant as I go, I have no plan and there is no vision of what the whole thing looks like when it is done. I am finding this approach much more fun. It always seems like that garden is incomplete because there is no real start or finish but that doesn't seem to matter to me anymore. Nor does the pallet of brick that I have been meaning to move for 2 years now :)

Valley of Fog

I rarely share photos taken with my phone but I came upon these today and wanted to share. The Valley full of fog on August 21, 2012.