Saturday, July 26, 2008

Cottage Garden musings ...and more...

So..hubby took the weed hacker to parts of the yard tonight..yep..it needed it..but daughter came running in telling me..."hey mom dad said he's gonna hack down the cottage garden!" yikes..we hadn't even had a chance to collect all the seed we had wanted to!

But..it did need hacked down because after all the hot weather we have had lately..well some of those gals looked less than stellar...and from some wind and rain they all wanted to "lay down and be lazy" So..hack away he did!"
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We managed to get a few things to salvage seed from and of course I had to make sure the "mad man with the weed hacker" didn't hack down my sharifa asma rose that was hidden in amongst the cottage garden "jungle"..ha.
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So..I'll have to rake out what remains of the cottage garden area and come fall or next Spring we should see another crop of lovely flowers springing up.At the time the house will be "on the market" we shall hopefully see a new crop of pretty flowers.
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We had coreopsis, blanket flower and gloriosa daisies out there.

We are working diligently on getting the backyard back into shape..and as such..we have removed our garden and are turning the yard back into..."gasp"..yeah..a "lawn" again. No more "farm garden" type things back there...its being converted back to just plain lawn.
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I have learned alot from this place/backyard...and at the next place I do not plan on having alot of different flower beds...

I think I want to have one large centrally located flower bed and then grow it out from there
...not seperate beds for this and that.

I have lots of area here that has to be weed edged and in the summer time it becomes a real chore especially in temperatures where the heat index reaches 100 plus.It makes for a bit more to maintain and to have to weed hack around and weed and mulch
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Oh..and hydroponics...I am SO going to be doing hydroponic gardening for my veggies..at least some of them.It will be much easier to grow items in hydropinic towers..or in containers.
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This yard is landscaped very nicely...we had only 1 lone oak in the back yard when we moved here and then we put in quite a lot of trees and a courtyard eating area and so forth
...but next home I intend to plan things out to the n'th.

And mulching..I am not going to skimp on mulching and weed blocking.
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And when it comes to mowing..if I hire it done..the person coming in to mow..must have a clean mower.
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One year someone came in with a dirty mower..and we wound up with thousands upon thousands of dandelion seed heads all over the yard within 2 weeks time! yes I know dandelions are a nice thing and edible..but shiminy's you should have seen all the puff balls all over my yard after they got done..and never had them before..I could have been making some serious dandelion wine I tell you!!..ha.So..this place has not been without its "lessons learned"
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I do think one of the things I will miss the most about this place and the backyard...is the drake elm outside my kitchen window
...for in it I have hung several bird feeders, and a "see Rock City" bird house
...but more than that...it is the "bird gathering tree"
...a pair of ring necked doves visit it every day at the same time...and cuddle/snuggle together on the same branch every day
...And in the winter time tons of birds come to feed from the feeders.
That part of things I shall really miss...and of course being able to look out the kitchen window and see the bright cheeriness of sunshine colored flowers blooming in the cottage garden.
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But in life comes change..and I am ready for change...
and am ready to pass the key soon to some new family that I hope will enjoy the things about this place that have made it a "home" for us for the last 8 yrs.
I hope that they will enjoy all the love and labor that we put into this place...
and will nurture and care for this little bit of "country in the city".
For soon I will be off on another adventure that awaits our family...and I'll be someday soon making another house into a "home"...and another backyard into a "sanctuary".
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Today I spent all day painting the hallway doors and front door and the a/c unit door.7 doors down the hallway to get painted...but..I'm now done with that part of things! yay! but wheew..I was tired after all of that.
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Then this evening we celebrated my little gals 4th birthday. She loved everything. What a fun age..she was so excited all day today knowing it was her birthday.
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My hallway redo chore is almost done...it had wound up taking far longer than I anticipated, but..the only thing that remains now is to do all the trim work...door frames, a decorative wood trim at the halfway point on the walls above the wallpaper..then the baseboards.
I will definitely be doing the "happy dance" when this task is out of the way.
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Well...I hope that you all have a lovely weekend!
Thanks for joining me in "blogland"

~The Garden Goose~

2 comments:

2 LMZ FARMS said...

Sounds like you have been busy. I need that mad man with the weed wacker here at my house.lol I hope your little princess had a wonderful 4th birthday. From the way you were talking it sounds like it's gonna be a great one!!!!

Ele at abitofpinkheaven said...

Tina, sounds like you have been doing a lot of work. Some of my flower beds have brick borders in the ground so I can mow right up to the flower bed. It's so much easier the weeding wacking. I do agree with you about having one big garden and working out from it. Enjoy the time you have left in your house, but even more wonderful adventures await you!