I've got some 'splainin' to do

The weekend was a busy one, and if I could have a month's worth of weekends like this past one, wow, the stuff we'd get done!   The weather was so nice and cool; just perfect for working.  And work we did.  Remember I said the remodeling job in the Formal Garden is coming along slowly?  I don't think 'slowly' is the correct adjective, I guess more like 'snail-y' would fit our progress better.

In case you've forgotten (and I wish I could) what we are doing is removing around 300 big rocks from the Formal Garden walls and replacing the boulders with flat limestone instead.  We started this project in May.  Yes, May.  And we're still not done.  We had high hopes we'd be done by June when the first bus trip arrived here for a tour, oh, my, how optimistic, chortle, chortle.  Why, this won't take much time at all, we'll simply yank out the rocks and the perennials and then we'll put the flat limestone walls in, reseed the lawn and Voila! all done for the tour group. Ha ha.

Maybe if we'd had a normal spring this year we could have gotten it all done if started in April, but this spring not much happened before May in the garden because it was so cold and wet.  I don't think the last snow melted until July, in fact, if I look around, I might still find a snowbank somewhere, that's right, it was a Short Summer.

This was how we started in May......hauling out the big rocks to make way for the flat walls.  There's Joel on the wrecker, hand-cranking a rock out.  One down, 399 to go.

Carl working on another one, we were lucky to get two or three of these big ones moved after he got home from work every night.  And then it rained and rained and yes, rained some more, so we were done working on this project for at least a month which was then planting season for all my annuals and then weeding season (does that ever end?) and then garden walks-a-rama so nope, we didn't get this done. 

But, we're making progress, here's the way this section looked before the new wall:

Here's what it looked like after the big stones were removed:

And here's what it looks like now:

Yes, there's still a long way to go yet, but Carl and Ann (who was able to help on Saturday!) got this section done while Joel and I were busy yanking more stones out in the rest of the garden.  You read that last sentence right, we had Ann and Joel here to help us.  We are so blessed and WAY more work gets done with help. 

Carl uses a board to make sure the wall is as flat as possible.

We're about halfway done around this enormous circle.......I think everyone has taken all the plants they want out of there, so now I can just chuck the rest.  Doesn't it look lovely?  Just think, every tour group saw this bountiful beauty when they came to visit.  Yuck.  But gardens have to change, and this one was long past-due for an overhaul.  We need to cut back and this is one bed I'm happy to be rid of because it can be very wet and difficult to grow things in, with the exception of weeds.........this border grew the most fantastic quack grass I've ever seen, if I missed some it would actually tower over me, and I'm kinda tall.  Very impressive weeds thrived in this bed, that I will say for it.

So, anyway, back to my story of the weekend.  Joel was free on Saturday and he kindly agreed to help his Maternal Unit (me) with hauling some rocks out of the Formal Garden.  We had all the really big boulders out of there by the end of May, but now there's a double row of good sized rocks still in place on the west side of the Formal Garden that we were working on.

 Here Joel is backing up to the first of the smaller boulders we have to load up.  I counted 200 of these. And then I recounted and came up with 203.  And then I nearly cried.

Joel's 184 Loboy International is small and fits down in the Formal Garden very nicely.  Some of these rocks were a lot heavier than I remembered and being so far back on the tractor,  Joel was having balance issues...

He would get halfway up the ramp and then one of two things would happen, the front end of the tractor would come off the ground:

Whoa........!! and then the rock would roll out of the bucket.  Then we'd have to get the rock back on the tractor.  Some of the rocks had to be loaded two or three times.  But we'd finally get them out of there in one piece.  (The rocks and Joel...he worries me sometimes.)

I didn't want to just load the stones up and dump them on a pile somewhere, I figure since we have them up in the air on the tractor we might as well put them someplace where we'll use them.  So some of the bigger ones went where the earlier boulders did, to the Woodland Bed.

 So as Joel and I loaded them up on his tractor, we hauled them to the other side of the property and dumped them in amongst the hostas. 

They're going to need burying a bit and tweaking on placement, but at least they're close to where I want 'em.

Soon it was becoming evident we were running out of places to put them in the hosta beds.  Hmmmmmmmmmm............now what?  Then I had an idea.  Yes, another one.

Do you see this dark and dingy place? 

This is the middle of three rows of spruce trees and what happens when they are planted too close together.  Yup, that's right, the needles fall off.  Isn't it just beautiful??  Yuck, again.

I'm trying to give you some perspective on where this is; do you remember the Something Else Bed?

Here we are approaching the trail leading between the Something Else Bed.  Those spruce trees on the left are part of the three rows I just showed you in the picture above.  And beyond those spruce trees is the Formal Garden.  When we planted the Formal Garden, we planned on having the spruce trees surround the bed so it would be private and sheltered, sorta like a secret garden, if you will.   Well,  that worked for the first 25 years or so, but now the trees have grown and though they look ok from the front, they sure don't look ok from the middle.  And this Something Else Bed was something I'd dreamed up last fall and it leads over the bridge:

Pudding posing on the bridge for me this morning.  Isn't she helpful?

Once you get over the bridge, there's the view going back the other way, but I'm getting ahead of myself: Before you get over the bridge the view is pretty dismal, all you saw was dead spruce tree branches up about 10' feet.  Well, that's changed.  Joel and I ran out of places to put the smaller rocks, so I got another Bright Idea about where to put the rocks.  Let's limb up those dead branches, Joel!  I don't have any pictures of the limbing up process, but we had four car trailers FULL of dead limbs when we got done.  Joel fired up the chainsaw and we worked together for about two hours on Saturday night.

So what did we accomplish (besides making a huge pile of brush?) in this area?  Is it now more beautiful?  Ahhhhhh......no.

Definitely not beautiful.  But less ugly.  Kind of.  Sort of. We may have to go higher and we still have a few more trees to limb up yet but we had to give up on account of darkness.  And this is where I am intending to put the rest of the 180+ rocks next.  Will it be a wall or a pile or a 'folly'?  (What's a folly? I always wondered, lol)  One thing I know for sure is, it will be work. But do you see that opening on the right side of the picture, where the sun is shining?  That's the Formal Garden and it is no longer hidden or secret.  Hmmmm yet again.  This is posing another problem.  Gardening, it's all about the problems.

Looking back toward the bridge.  Ok, maybe we made a mistake, ok, maybe I made a mistake (I'll take all the blame since we can't put the branches back on, but they were dead anyway.)  Carl was watching the trees limbs disappear from the Formal Garden while he was working on the wall and he said he was wondering when we were going to quit sawing. 

Carl's view from where he was working...you can kind of see the Something Else bed from the Formal Garden now.  Oooops.

But, I hastened to tell Carl, 'Doesn't your wall look NICE down there?'  (I was trying to buy myself some time to think how I was going to fix this mess.)

"But you can see the road through the trees now," Carl said.

'Um, yes, I noticed that," I said. "But I have a plan."

Carl is not one to groan, but I could see it there, barely suppressed, just waiting to escape from his throat.  I started walking to the newly trimmed up area and kept on talking.  Fast.  That's right, I'm a fast-talker.  But not a smooth talker, apparently....

"See, Joel just hauled some of the rocks up there and I think if we pile them up into a nice low wall or something, we could have a very pleasant walkway through there, don't you?  Or we could extend the Something Else Bed into a little higher wall and that would block the view from both directions.  What do you think about using the granite boulders with the flat limestone that's already there?  We could pile them up, I don't think it would look all that stupid, do you?  It would be like a Secret Garden Stone Wall!  Wouldn't that be cool? But if that doesn't work, I guess we'll have to get more flat rock to make that idea fly.  So what do you think?" 

I turned around and found myself alone.  Carl wasn't following along.  Oh, boy.  He did answer me from the Formal Garden which is only about 20' away; he could hear me, he just didn't follow along on my little flight of fancy because he's already working on trying to finish the first flight o' fancy we started this spring.

"I think it's a great idea, but I don't want to mix limestone and granite.  However, a low stone wall might not look too bad.  We'll see how it looks when you get all the stones up there," he said.  (I bet he did groan, I just wasn't there to see it.)  I appreciate Carl more than he knows, we're in this garden mess together, for better or worse.  And many of my ideas are worse.

There's Carl's transit legs, perched in the dome where he uses it for leveling the walls he's working on.  Many people have asked us if we had someone draw up landscaping plans for us, or if we put it all down on paper before we proceed and the shameful answer is, No.  We rarely plan much of anything and all the garden areas have simply evolved out of necessity or some Bright Idea one or the other of us has had over the years.  The chainsaw is in constant use around here and sometimes we saw down one too many limbs or trees and regret it, but that's gardening, it's like life.

It changes.

So Joel and I limbed up a few too many branches?  What can you do?  Start a campfire and have a weenie roast.

Did I mention Joel sawed down a lot of branches?

And speaking of bonfires....Guess who had a birthday on Sunday? 

The Elusive Lucille, that's who.  Yesterday was her 91st birthday and her silly daughter (me) made her another lame sheet cake and THEN forgot to buy 91 candles, so she ended up holding a big candle instead.

  Notice how her expression changes from

Happy here........until she realizes Carl has a camera and she is the Center of Attention!

Duck, Carl!  I think she might be flinging a chocolate cake in your general direction!  Oh, how Mom hates being photographed.

But she refrained from flinging her cake and blew out her candle instead.

Sunday was really wild around here, and I had even more explaining to do.  We all went out to eat for Mom's birthday and then had to hustle home because we had some people coming for a garden walk at around 4PM.  A lady had called me on Friday to find out if it was ok to bring a few people out on Sunday to see the garden.  I wasn't thinking when I said, 'Sure' and had forgot all about Sunday being Mom's birthday, but everything worked out fine.

Even when a tractor parade was thrown in the mix in the morning:

and then out to eat with Mom at noon, home by 2PM, run around and pick up as much as we could before the folks came for the tour at 3PM (which was early, but good, since it started to rain awhile at 4PM)  I wasn't expecting as many people for the tour though.  Five cars pulled in and people kept piling out, it turns out they were having a family reunion and decided to stop here as the end of their reunion.  I didn't know any of them at all, but they were pleasant and fun to be around.  We enjoyed their visit very much. 

After they left at 4PM, we got a Sheepshead game going with Mom, Ann, Joel, Carl and I and played for several hours.  Later on, Cody, Briana and baby Clara stopped in for a visit, too.  When I took Mom home at eleven pm, she said, "I had a wonderful day."

I hope so, Mom, I really do.

I know what I wished for when you blew out your candle.

I wish I could explain what she means to me, but I think she knows.  Words aren't adequate.

I love you, Mom.

Fertilizer Friday: What's Still Blooming Here

Fertilizer Friday again.  Hard to believe another week has passed; I don't know where the time goes.  Thank goodness Tootsie has Flaunt Your Flowers every week or I'd forget what day we're on.  There's going to be a lot of pictures of Ernie the Urn today; I'm so impressed with those Supertunia Bubblegum flowers.  There's a sweet potato vine in there somewhere, but the petunias have been giving the sweet potato a run for it's money.  A neighbor stopped in the other day and said I should trim the flowers back so the urn was visible.  I told him to trim his cornfield back so we could see the soil.  He wasn't amused.

Ernie's Supertunia 'Bubblegum' petunias keep going strong. 

 I ran around the yard taking pictures last night just before supper and 'ran' was the operative word.  The temperatures have cooled down a bit, but the mosquitoes haven't given up for the season.  They're just as ravenous as ever.

Ernie from the sweet potato side.

I keep hoping no big ol' thunderstorms come to hammer Ernie to bits.  I have to rig up something to cover him in the event of storms and/or frost. 

I have the same petunias planted in the ground in front of Ernie and in the pots in the background.  I can see why this plant is a Proven Winner.  It's proven itself to me.

Here it is in Carl's wrought iron planter in a much smaller planter mixed in with a darker color Wave petunia. 

And here's two more of them planted in the ground by the White Lady...she must have fertilizer in that jug she's watering them with.

Ernie really steals the show in the driveway, though.  He's the Center of Attention.  I'm going to have to think of something pretty for the winter season for him.  Last year I stuck a bunch of pine branches in and it looked silly since I never got around to putting anything else in there with the pine branches.  Any ideas for winter decorations in the Big Guy?  We never had any color in this part of the yard before. 

The planter on the end of the driveway is doing really well.  This bed has only a few inches of soil because the culvert for our yard is right underneath.  I stuck the planter there as an afterthought and so far, it's working out.  It hasn't even been blown into the driveway by any west winds---yet.  The 'Denver Daisy' rudbeckias are very strong growers, this is the first year for them.

The lightshade planters are still growing strong, too.  I have a variety homegrown petunias in them.   They are almost as tall as the Jester millet and the calla lilies.

Let's see what else is going on around here:  the Naked Ladies (oooo-la-la) ok, 'Surprise Lilies' aka lycoris squamigera, are popping up all over the place.  Whatever name they go by they're always a surprise.

A random hibiscus.  This poor guy is planted in the Formal Garden in the bed I'm going to eliminate.  Time to find him a new home.

Speaking of the Formal Garden renovations, ah, well, let's not talk about them.  They're still not done.

'Kyushu' hydrangea and a rock.  I like the hydrangea very much, but have to learn how to prune it correctly.  Anyone else out there own one?  Do you leave the dried flower heads on for winter interest or do you cut it back when the flowers start to fade?  Pruning is an acquired talent, isn't it?

'Autumn Joy' sedum is starting to turn pink and pretty soon the miscanthus will send up it's flower heads.  The rocks look good in all seasons, can't beat rocks for seasonal interest.  That is, if you love rocks like I do, lol.

This is the newest planters we bought this year and they're sporting another type of Proven Winner, I think this one is 'Raspberry Blast'.  This one hasn't been growing as long as the 'Bubblegum' in Ernie, and is in more shade, so it's hard to say what the result would be in identical growing conditions.

I forget the name of this hydrangea, but the dark leaves really set off the snow white blooms. 

The walkway between the Pachyberm and the house is getting narrower as the plants get bigger.

Carl did some repairs to the Ball Fountain and it is running more smoothly now.  He built this several years ago and has been constantly tweaking it ever since.  The balls are quite heavy and sit on top of water and spin--when it works right.  Sometimes it just sits and drips, but that's ok, too.  The butterflies come in for drinks on the wet rocks and if I was a better photographer, I'd show you some, lol.

 Another urn full of portulaca, I wonder if it will flower til frost, or should I deadhead or trim it? Anyone know?

 Riverbed still winding through the yard. 

 The echinaceas are fading in color, but the bees and butterflies don't seem to mind.

 I know I have an abundance of yellow in the gardens, probably too much, but they are cheery. 

 Here's one that's not yellow, that's a welcome change of pace.

 Pink Diamond hydrangea planted on the Pachyberm, I didn't know they liked so much sunlight.

 Red 'Avalanche' petunias weren't supposed to be planted on the hill, I wanted them for the pots, but then the name tags got mixed up, so I have them in both places.

 Salvia farinacea 'Victoria' I started two flats from seed and they are very shy to flower this summer.  I wish they were doing better because blue goes so well with yellow and well, everything!

 Speaking of blue, that's a blue Castor Bean.  They are finally starting to get a little taller now, though they should be over 7'.  This was a weird growing season for them. 

 More random petunias in a planter out front with a curly sedge, 'Red Rooster' in the middle.  I love that grass and wish it would overwinter here.  I wonder if I brought it in the house?

 Rocks, rocks and

more rocks.  The trick is to have so many rocks that it looks like your garden is full of plants.  And if some of the plants are conifers, then they really fill up an area and things look even better, so my lesson for the day is: 

You can never have too many rocks.

And a few random statues tossed in here and there.  I don't have as many statues as I have rocks, though, that would be a scary sight.  (And winter storage would be a real problem, lol)

I wanted the 'Avalanche' petunias to do just that, avalanche down the rocks.  They're starting to, a little. 

There's always next year to try to get things right.

Red celosia 'Fresh Look' is living up to its name too, in front of the sedums here.

The sweet potato vine planted on the hill is taking over the rocks.  (No room for weeds, either.)

I had to get the sprinkler out yesterday afternoon to water for the first time this month.  We've been so blessed with an abundance of rain this year up til now.  How do you like my homemade rainbow?  (I checked, there is no pot of gold at the end.)

'Blue Shag' dwarf white pine and........anyone, anyone??? Oh, very good!  Rocks.

More yellow--'Yellow Ribbon' arborvitae surrounded by rudbeckia 'Goldstrum' with a yellow juniper in the foreground. 

The water is finally down to the normal pond level for the season.  We like to have a little sandy beach to walk on.

Someone warned me that the rudbeckia 'Goldsturm' would take over if left to it's own devices and I guess they were right.  I can think of worse invaders than them, though.

Melampodium 'Melanie' is another annual I planted, and yes, it's yellow.  Well, maybe next year I'll think ahead a little more.  I wish it came in another color besides yellow since it's form is wonderful.

I started about 100 plants of melampodium this Spring and they all survived. 

We pulled out about a hundred or so rudbeckias as they started to mildew a few weeks ago and now the second flush of seedlings is starting to flower.  These are all self-sown just as the earlier ones were.

My talent at butterfly photography is really, really not good.......see those two blobs in the blue sky?  There they are, Butterflies! (Sorry.)

 

Finally, The End.  

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!  I'm off to see what's blooming at Tootsie's!