Saturday, July 25, 2009

I am covered in Dirt

I am covered in dirt. And I am rather happy about it.
This has been an INCREDIBLY busy summer for me. For example, I got home at 8 pm last night, and it was one of the earliest nights this month.
So today, when I had nothing scheduled (and could have slept in), of course I woke up at 5:30 am. Which allowed me to do lovely things like think. And surf around online. And look at blogs and Facebook and update Twitter and follow newslinks and all those lovely things that simply are not a high enough priority in the busy-busy work day.
When it became a decent hour, I mowed. Not the grass- it is in that happy state of summer-slow-growth. But the dandelions were putting out seed puffs. And there were a couple corners of the yard the blackberry brambles are encroaching on. And a corner or two where the grass has seed heads and is actually 4 feet high or laying on the ground.
Anyway, the mowing progressed into weeding some flower beds, then into a trip to the garden store! So I am $90 poorer, but plant richer :)
Here is project #1:
Lavender is now planted all along the front walk, with a nice mounding type of strawberry as ground cover (thanks Jewel- I will be returning the bucket they came in). We 5 different types of lavender & some chives too. And I picked up a couple bright red Astilbe to try in that spot next to the front steps which is always a problem.
We couldn't stop with just one project of course!
Project #2 is for the back yard.
We have a little triangle of grass, kind of beteween the garden house and studio that is a waste of a perfectly good garden spot. It gets full sun, is visible from the house and patio and is well contained between sidewalks.
We grabbed 2 types of coreopsis (one of my all time favorite plants after our trip to the National Botanical Gardens in Wales) a hebe (never planted one of these before), a lovely gray-greened foliage primrose with tiny yellow-white flowers, and something that is like a heather with large bell flowers that is new to this area. Oh- and one echinacea. I will move the existing irises to be a mid height plant I think. And that shrub thing (a privet I think) will be a nice backdrop, until I decide it needs to live somewhere else.
I think that is a good variety of heights and foliage and flowers... hopefully it will fill in this bit of space and inspire me to more time in the yard.
While I didn't spend the day sewing, as I had hoped, at least my day is filled with pretty things. And maybe sewing will happen this week.
Maybe.