Shoots and Starts

Garden Grows (Slow)

'Tis July: cicadas whine in maples, cardinals sing in the sugar-gum, hot wind hums in pines. Ah yes, the hot winds. The hot, HOT, hot winds. Alas.

The weeks of July have brought down upon the nation a heat wave heavy as lead. Highs have reached into the triple digits with maddening regularity, and the Winter "garden" has suffered. The hydrangea hangs her head, the lawn loses green. Even the tomatoes seem fatigued. And I, sorry blogger that I am, have put off my garden update too long, it seems. It should have been done in glorious June, when all was lush and (relatively) cool. But garden update there will be, heat or no.

Heat or no, fast or slow, our "garden" develops. Do you remember how it looked in March?



The scene has improved drastically since March. We have acquired a pallet, a framework and a plan. I should be content with the "garden" as such. Unfortunately, our "framework" was *originally* due to be completed by the contractor in April. April came and went with not a weed shifted, not a bit of ugly concrete removed, not a brick laid. Now, deep in July, the frame is set, the pallet prepared, but heat, lack of growing time, and lack of (ahem) funds have done some damage to my garden, which I had hoped would look like these:



But, in fact, I must content myself with empty and nearly empty beds. In the heat the ground is dry and weeds thrive as the newly planted flowers hang their heads. Alas.

But gardens grow slow. They teach us patience. I must hearken back to what has been accomplished. Piles of reclaimed brick have become a lovely patio. The boxwood hedge is planted (though it is not quite a hedge just yet). The maple is in the ground and alive (though the combination of black-thumb Me and the July heat-wave did its best to kill it). The new grass has also survived. A few perennials light up one bed. And the hydrangeas still bloom their green blooms.

Here are some pictures of our garden, taken in June. Hopefully they will give you an idea of the progress made, and hint of things in store for us in the future. Stay tuned for future posts on "Winter Garden Stage 2: Inspiration and Perspiration."

The Garden Begins

Spring cometh. "The droghte of March hath perced to the roote," and loveliness sits poised beneath the surface of every lawn, every bare bed, behind the velvety shield of every bud on every tree. The children are frolicking, the dogs skitter around the yard with their tales tucked under. Everyone and every thing has spring fever. Including me.

This year my spring fever exhibits itself in two ways. First: allergies. Alas, I am allergic to grass (I lived poised on the edge of the Prairie) and, Alas, also trees (I live in a densely wooded city). So if I seem to weep, if I bury my face in a tissue, if my eyes brimmeth over, don't worry. It's not depression, existential angst, deep-seated dismay--only allergies.

Now, thankfully, this year my spring fever encompasses more than allergies. This year I have GARDEN FEVER.

Now our current garden does not exist. In fact, the state of our outdoor property is dire. The only virtue our back yard possesses is its blank-slatedness. That is--if you ignore the variety of weeds-substituted-for-grass and interesting patio "stones" laid out at random behind the house. Behold our "blank slate":

...desperately in need of screening...
"grass"

The hawks like to kill and eat pigeons on our "grass". At least someone likes it (not the pigeons.)

Even here, something springs forth. (What is it??)

The blank-slateness of our back yard, combined with the horror of its weedy barrenness, have haunted me since last July. Through the long winter months I have stared out the window, sketched, stared, read, stressed, sketched some more, etc.--trying to come up with a working plan for the garden which will be. I have so so so many ideas... Poly-culture, density, vistas, texture, developing "rooms," perineal borders, self-sufficiency, edible landscape, formal structure... the list goes on. I have so many ideas. I have - so - little - knowledge/experience/time. !! I just know I will get myself in over my head. Probably I will end up midsummer with brown grass, truckloads of tomatoes and twelve dead rose bushes. Anyway. I stressed, I obsessed--all winter.

and then I hired a landscape architect. Don't judge too harshly. I had dreams of designing the whole structure myself, planting trees, growing crops from seeds, developing unique poly-culture systems. I had dreams of doing everything myself.

But something motherhood has taught me/ is teaching me: I cannot do everything myself. Least of all gardening, which (it turns out) I know nothing about. So. I brought all of my stresses, obsessive sketches, and photo inspirations to the table--and showed them to my landscape architect.

Then he came back to me with this:

Now isn't that satisfying?? (that is, if you can read anything at all...)

What this plan included is: a brick patio which enters (by way of boxwood-lined gravel path) into a wooded "room" at the back of the yard. There is space planned for herb garden, perineal beds, roses, ornamental trees, a happy maple, and two porticos to create shade and upon which grapes might grow. Mr. Landscape Architect has, of course, overplanted our imaginary garden and we will be changing some things to allow for a fairly limited budget.

We also will be leaving several beds *empty* so that I might have my little poly-culture/edible landscape/high density perineal experiment. A little trying, a little failing, a little learning is healthy, yes?

Stay tuned for further developments...