Mother Nature cooperated enough to allow me to finally get some gardening/outdoor work done this weekend. It was still damp but not pouring and that’s good enough for me! I got some wicked deals at the Superstore Garden center this weekend (25% off plus tax free!) which allowed me to finish my projects.
Outside of a little gardening with my mom growing up (and that was mainly deck/planter box gardening) I’m a total newbie at this. I haven’t killed anything yet though! I would say I have a ‘yellow thumb’, it’s not green yet, we’ll see in September how well I’ve done.
Using my prior knowledge and the helpful tool of Google, I was able to plant my first raised garden bed. I knew what I thought I should do, I just confirmed with the Google experts. Here’s the result:
I planed three boxwood shrubs, two dahlias and two kong coleus (mosaic leaf) plants.
How pretty are the Kong Coleus leaves?
I love them, one of my favorite annuals. Coleus plants come in a few different variations, this one is my favorite though.
On top of getting the raised garden in, which I’m uber proud of by the way, I put mulch in the front garden boxes around my two GINORM-O hostas (which I already trimmed!) and dwarf ceders:
Please ignore how dirty our brand-spankin’ new driveway/walkway is. Gardening is a messy job and getting the dirt out of a black driveway=IMPOSSIBLE. We’re borrowing my father-in-law’s pressure washer soon to clean ‘er up (along with the deck).
Continuing the tour around our property, the snowball bush I planted earlier this spring (NOT DEAD!):
It was an itty-bitty baby with no flowers when I bought it, it still has the potential to get this big though!
Pretty little white snowflakes:
When we bought the house we inherited a full house-length of day lilies and a peony (one of my favorite flowers):
Neither are open yet but that doesn’t stop ants from crawling all over them…
I also bought another of my favorite plants this weekend ($29.99 down to $15.00 tax-in!), a Forever & Ever hydrangea. It is a hydrangea that blooms repeatedly all summer. They come in different colors, I will show you later what it looks like, for now it is just starting to peek out:
I only did one small planter box this year. Once the yard gets established I’ll spend my summers planting a lot more annuals. I couldn’t resist the new black petunias though:
I wasn’t the only one busy working in the garden this weekend…
It’s that time of year folks. Spider season. I don’t mind though, I’d much rather spiders (who stay outside) than millions of ants (infesting every nook and cranny of my house).
To summarize, here’s an idea as so how far our exterior has come:
Now, with new siding, driveway and windows, a wicked garden (go me!) and some old fashion TLC:
It’s coming along nicely if I do say so myself.
Now if only I could get the grass looking better. This picture is making it look better than it really does, or this is the yard’s ”good angle”? You saw what we had to work with in the ‘before’.
Any tips for a GREENER LAWN?
It was raining the afternoon we decided to do it so we worked inside. To prep the screen all we did was finish ripping off the old screen and wipe it clean:
Following the instructions (like a good girl!), we cut the new screen to slightly larger than outer frame of the door:
After choosing the proper size binding (the kit came with three diameters), using the spline tool, we started in one corner and started pushing the spline into the groove:
Even with two people, preventing the screen from moving around while placing the spline was difficult so I used clips to hold in place:
When we were done trimming we re-hung the door:
It still needs a little oil but it works just fine and keeps the buggies out! Oh Happy Summer!
