Lillies?

lilliesnew
Originally uploaded by nicole radja

Some flowers have been popping up where the rose garden is to be, next to the garage. I hope they are the orange ones!

Compost

Just installed the new composter. Now kitchen scraps have a place to go. I read you can even put your hair in there.

Backyard is puddling

With Spring has come melting snow and we've already had a couple big rain storms. I have learned that my yard holds water in the back in 2 ponds. I have the feeling it's not just the runoff from my house and garage, but that I'm getting the neighbors' runoff as well. Yikes.

Some grading and a Rain Garden seems to be the answer here.

Sketches

Last week I began sketching what was in my head for the garden. My husband made a sketch of the plat to scale on some graph paper, we made copies, got out the colored pencils and started sketching.

I feel fairly confident in what I want in the front yard. I am going to start small. I would like to plant a tree in my parkway, I just have to check with my town if that is acceptable. I live on a T intersection, and have fears of someone driving into my house. Also, I would like to look out my front window and see a big pretty tree and some red autumn color to balance with the big yellow tree on the left side of the parkway.

Plants I think would be nice in the front foundation garden are Rattlesnake Master (awesome name), lots of purple cone flower, tall grasses on the left side, shorter grasses on the right, and tons of Prairie Smoke in the front. Maybe some Joe Pye weed, Black eyed Susans and the like. I love color and would like to have a serious color statement with the front yard.

I have also been considering a Japanese Maple. I love their size, autumn color and the weeping Japanese Maples are just so cool.

My husband wants his "prize winning rose bushes" next to the garage. I would also like a meditation garden. A place where I can practice martial arts and really relax and escape. Then we will have a big patch of turf in the back for rounds of badminton and for our toddler to play.

First Post

Exterior, originally uploaded by nicole radja.

Last autumn, I bought my first home. In the search for this home, it was essential that the home be placed on a nice yard that I could garden. The result was a sunny plot with a 3 bedroom post war box on top of it. The house looks like every other house in the neighborhood, quite literally. My garden will be a revolt against the topiary foundation plantings in front of every other box in the neighborhood.

Over the winter, in my mind, I planned this garden. It would be filled with native plants. Not as a result of being an environmentalist but simply as a display of where I live and in remembrance of what the world looked like before Europeans pillaged the land, boxed it off and sold it. My inspiration comes from a pbs series I saw called We Shall Remain and a book my brother loaned me Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee by Dee Brown. After reading this, crying, and digesting the genocide of Native people, I wanted to do my small part to bring back the land they adored. It's a measly attempt, I know.

This blog is my gardening diary. I have spent the winter watching 9pm gardening television shows on pbs (Garden Home, P Allen Smith, Victory Garden, Ask This Old House) and some advice was to keep a garden journal. I'm not much of a journal keeper, unless I can post photos to it, since I am a photographer, so this medium works well for me. If someone else can learn from my mistakes or triumphs, or other gardeners' comments will help me, even better!

Please enjoy, comment if you please, and thank you!