Better Late than Never!

While the rest of you are posting stunning images of your Autumn tables, Thanksgiving, even Christmas; I am here, just barely dusting Summer off my flip flops!

Though still a work in progress, I want to share some of my gardens with you!

I remember there was NOTHING here when we moved in four years ago.

We removed all the compacted, hardpan, clay soil, 2-3 feet deep and replaced it with garden soil in all the beds as we went...

Let's start with the backyard...

The Potager

You cannot tell but the raised beds are cut away on an angle toward the center.  I added fence post finials to the beds for a finishing touch.

I took this photo before I leveled the plinths that the concrete fruit topiary baskets rest upon.  The pedestals are mysteriously heavy.

Rest assured they are level now.

The color was of the utmost importance.

I enlisted the help of the highly trained professional at the Home Depot paint counter one afternoon...

Me, "Does this look like a green-y blue, grey-ish black to you?" 

Him, "Yes".

Me, "Is this one more green-y?  You know, like teal?"

Him, "Yes".

Me, "Four-score and seven years ago, our Fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation!"

Him, "Yes".

It was at that moment that I realized I was alone.

This is the closest I could get to green-y blue, grey-ish black before Home Depot closed for the evening.

This is the first time I have ever planted vegetables.  I overdid it by a wide margin.  As in "feeding an entire Third World country with the excess" wide margin. 

Imagine my chagrin when my neighbors refused to make eye contact, lest I accost them with 30 lbs of zucchini or such an abundance of tomatoes that I had to use a wheelbarrow to bring them to their door!  

Yes.   That happened.

"These are heirloom!"  I would exclaim as I attempted to divest myself of the evidence of my folly.

Next year I will know better.  I hope I remember.

 The boxwood surrounding the perimeter of the potager will make a great frame in a few years.  I still may make a lattice fence to keep the bunnies out of the strawberries!

This year it didn't matter because I had so much I didn't even care what the bunnies ate.

Grace tried to get them to eat the broccoli but it was a no-go.

Their diet consisted mainly of strawberries and random nibbles of cucumbers. I wonder if the cucumbers made them burp?

Do rabbits burp?

If you know the answer, please leave it in the comments.

The Parterre

The parterre built itself!  I had no big plans.  It just kind of happened.

It started with a six foot circular bed filled with lavender.  I paid the neighborhood kids ten cents a stone to use as drainage in the bed, then filled it with bags of garden soil.

Then, one night, I couldn't sleep...

and the rest is history!

Here is the parterre the day I finished planting.  This is before the pea gravel and the limestone curbing.

It's just a wee hedgerow here!

Here is the parterre last month.  The angel was my Birthday present last December but it wasn't delivered until Spring.

The Limelight hydrangea in the lower right corner is part of a long hedge. The yew hedge to the lower left, is on its way to knitting itself together too!

Last Winter's harsh weather took its toll on the growth of the boxwood.  I had to clip quite a bit away.  It is filling in nicely, however. I also changed the triangular shapes around the lilac standards into curlicues.

Do you want to know something funny?

I mean, downright hysterical?

I thought...get this...I thought that a garden would be much less work than a lawn!

I thought I would actually be afrolic amongst the flowers all Summer!  Not a care in the world!  Flowers in our hair! Flowy dresses!  Cucumber sandwiches!

Yeah, well, I just finished closing up the beds.  Many shrubs and perennials are stored in the garage until Spring.  The ground froze before I got to them

I was able to plant a privet hedge as well as a reading garden surrounded by privet, though!

I had to replant all the arborvitae, over 50, that died last Winter and all the annabelle hydrangeas, and over 300 perennials in the Shakespeare beds, as well as 14 pear trees!  Oh!  And the apple trees!

That is another post for another day.

I still have to get bulbs in the ground!

xo

Andie