Sunday, May 07, 2006

Why can't it rain on Tuesdays?

I had a super productive day yesterday. In addition to trying out the strawberry rhubarb soup recipe (see previous entry), I made great strides in some yard work I had been neglecting. In the morning, after my trip to the Farmers Market, I started hacking away at the back garden, which has really become more of a weed corral than an actual garden. It's been hard to find things that thrive there (Nigella and purple coneflowers love it. In fact, the purple coneflowers are acting like they own the place), plus recent droughtiness has made me not really feel like putting in much effort. But it's gotten to the point where if I don't put the work in, it will just become a snake habitat, and I certainly don't want that. I was going to put in more work there today but now it's raining (although that is a great time for weed-pulling).

I also did a little work in the front garden, which is shaping up beautifully. It;s been an evolution over the past several years, ever since I decided to give up on growing grass there and turn it into a garden. I started with no real plan, just a decision to work within the existing border plantings (bearded irises, creeping phlox and daisy mums). Yesterday I added a couple of annuals (a container of amaranth "Love Lies Bleeding," some lantana (which may be perennial depending on what the winter is like) and a Mexican heather.

I realized yesterday that the layout of the garden has clearly manifested itself at this point, and I rally need to put in a path. But I'm against spending a bunch of money on stones, and I don't want to put in anything too uniform or prefab-looking--it would go against the crazy mish-mash aesthetic I've got going on (which was the only "planned" aspect of the garden--that I didn't want it to look planned). So then it hit me that I have the makings of a footpath already--I've been collecting all kids of stones and bricks, plus a bunch of flagstones I pulled out of the back--and I can just arrange them all higgledy-piggledy into a path. So I started that ... I'll keep at it piecemeal through the summer. If you have any interesting bits of stone or brick that you don't need I'm accepting donations.

Alas, today it's raining, which could be a sign from the universe that I should focus on the inside of my house now. I think I just need to get rid of everything I own. That would neaten the place up a bit.

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