Gardens and Mulch

The weather this past week has been wonderful. Crisp and cool when you wake, warm during the day and then cool again in the evening. I suppose we wouldn't appreciate it if it was like this all the time ..... but I would be willing to try!

This is the garden I "built" for my bestie, Martha. It is three years old now and the grass and weeds had begun to take over. I should have taken some "before" shots, but hind sight and all that. I didn't. Use your imagination. It was awful. There were weeds as tall as me. Martha swore they were going to bloom and that she liked them. 

Andrea of the green thumb and I knew better. They were weeds and the only thing they were going to do was spread their seed until they fully took over. I worked alone some days and Andrea worked alone some days, some of the time we worked in unison. I kept asking myself why I had made it so big, Andrea was asking me that, too.

Those tall weeds had completely blocked the view of the rustic little bench. Grass was everywhere, choking out the flowers. Andrea was all about pulling the grass and weeds out, Martha took the weed whacker to the grass ....... leaving those tall weeds. I gathered all the newspapers and cardboard I could find. We weeded around the flowers and then laid cardboard or newspapers on top of the grass and weeds. Covered it with a very thick layer of mulch.

The Sycamore tree is impressive. It was only a twig about 2 feet tall when I carefully dug it up and planted it here. After the first winter, Martha declared it to be dead, along with the Maple trees I planted. Martha can be impatient, but I think she would agree that she was happy to be proved wrong. Cosmos are blooming and I added 7 cone flower plants and some Hostas under the trees.

A Birch tree was blocking the view and I cut it down, along with those hideous weeds. I found these interesting limbs in my wood pile and roped them together around the stub of that Birch tree. There are 4 birdhouses and I need one more to finish. See the round one at the highest point?

I was swinging it by the chain it had been hanging from on my front porch as I walked to the golf cart where the gorilla glue waited. I had another one in my other hand. I heard a buzzing sound and then saw a wasp, then another. I thought they were coming from the other bird house and I tossed it to the ground as I moved away to put some distance between me and the stinging insects.

So, I am walking in circles, trying to figure out just why the wasps are following me, when I realize that I am carrying them in the swinging bird house. I grabbed my can of wasp spray from the golf cart (it is, after all my defense weapon). I managed to kill them all and not get stung.

This garden was a long project. I have been working on it all summer. It was a little overwhelming, to say the least. I don't know that I could have done it without Andrea's help. I would have, it just wouldn't be done just yet. There is well over 400 buckets of mulch in that garden. A lot of my sweat and maybe even a drop or two of blood. I have asked everyone to stop me if I try to create another one that big!