Garden Outlines

For whatever reason, the front (west) and south gardens have been fighting us all the way.

While gardens under the kitchen window add some color to the house,
we need to have a more prominent garden in the front under the bedroom windows.

The south garden held the remnants of the bush we removed.
It will be disposed of as of Monday morning.

We started our task by going to Eden Nursery and picking out plants that would work with the sunlight and shade for the western and southern exposures.  We did not purchase anything yet, but at least we have a plan.  Anna told me which, of the plants that I had chosen, would work and which ones would be a waste of money.  I think I'll go with Anna's suggestions.

As we did with the back gardens, our first step was to outline the gardens with edger pavers.  We started early yesterday with the front garden by digging out the edger trench, adding paver base, and laying down the edgers.  Rick decided to rely on our string line and the level to add the pavers.  We checked the edgers occasionally with the transit to make sure that we were at the correct elevation.  By noon, he had half of the front area completed.

After lunch, we checked the elevations and levels again, and Rick decided that we had the first edgers way too high for the terrain that we would encounter when we turned the corner to the south side.  So back to the drawing board he went, adjusting the first edgers down and then following that level across the front of the house.

At the end of the day, we stood back and looked at the day's work.  It was not right.

Although Rick used the line and the level, we could see that the edgers were still going uphill on one end.  While Rick had been working on the edgers, I was busy within the garden digging up the grass and the weeds that grew next to the house.  I filled one full lawn bag with debris, and I had taken less than half of the turf that I needed to remove.  By 4:00 p.m., we both were very tired.

We noticed, however, that we were not completely exhausted as we had been earlier in the week.  Yes, we are getting good exercise and are adjusting to the work, but the major factor that was different was the temperature.  While we completed the first part of the back gardens with temperatures in the 80s -- and high humidity -- we were relieved to feel the temperature drop yesterday all day long.  We started warm, but as a "cold front" came through, we felt almost chilled by the end of the day.  Today started in the low 60s and never reached higher than the low 70s, so working outside, even in the sun, was not intolerable.

We decided last night that we would have to redo the front edgers once again.  Gr-r-r-r! Due to the position of the sun, we started today's work at the southern corner, working down the southern side while it was still in the shade, toward the back of the house.  This time we used the transit to check our elevations every two edgers, making sure that they also were level as we worked along.

The blank south wall will look much better once we add some
colorful vegetation. 

The south garden curves inward to give access
to the back yard gate.

We actually ran out of paver base, so Rick went to the store just before lunch.  He discovered that Lowe's was totally out of paver base, so he had to travel further to Home Depot in order to get the supplies we needed.  I stayed behind to watch over the transit and other equipment as I continued to dig out the grass and weeds within the garden outlines.

After lunch, Rick tackled the front edgers once again.  We ended up brining the original edgers on northern end of the front garden up one and a half inches.  Sadly, that is the elevation which Rick originally had put the edgers on the first time he put them down.  He made adjustments down the line so that the front and side garden edgers now all match in elevation and level.  Our front yard is far from level, so finally getting this wall in the correct position was quite a task.

The front garden, once cleaned out, will be filled with
evergreens, shrubs with red flowers, and green-and-white
grasses.

Tomorrow we'll work on getting the rest of the garden area cleared of grass and weeds so we can start the planting on Monday morning ... if we can move by then!