My Adventures in Gardening

Holy exhaustion! Boy did I underestimate what it takes to be a gardener. Every muscle in my body aches, I'm sunburnt, and just got done taking a two hour nap after 3 days of gardening/landscaping in our yard. I re-bedded two shrub beds (laid down plastic, installed plastic edging, & laid down new mulch) and one tree bed, A.R. tackled the layout and tilling of our vegetable garden, and I cleared and planted 4 mini-gardens under the fence that is on top of a hill on our property. I have to say I think I bit off a bit more then I could chew...and poor A.R. was such a trooper helping out.

A.R learned how to work a tiller this weekend and was able to get our soon-to-be veggie garden tilled and fenced in. We rented a tiller from Home Depot and had to return the thing back at 11:57 on Sunday morning...we had it back at exactly 11:53am! We didn't plan very well before we rented the tiller which we only had for 24 hours. In hindsight, we should've completely prepared the land and staked out the garden BEFORE renting the tiller. The grass was so high and thick A.R. had to weed wack it down with the brush attachment for our trimmer and then rake the grass clippings to the side before tilling the area. I think we'll be looking into getting the tiller attachment to our trimmer this week to further till the land as the places where the land is harder need another pass with a tiller. Here is a picture of it after tilling, but before fencing:

I think Home Depot probably owns a few shares of our house right now. I think we went there no less then 5 times this weekend and really need to make one last trip for more mulch for one of my shrub beds! We went there so many times my bank card called to make sure there wasn't fraud activity happening on our card. LOL.

Here are some pictures of the planting I did under the fence installed by our builder on our property. The fence is at the top of a steep hill at the end of the cul-de-sac in our yard. I actually love the fence they put in even though it's more for safety then to be pretty. It took me FOREVER to hoe down under the fence as the ground was really tough and rocky and even though A.R. tried to make a pass with the tiller he couldn't really get under it well with the awkward machine. I planted Hostas (given to me by a friend) under the fence alternating with green with white centers and solid green. At the end fence post on either side I planted a Lily plant. I plan on still planting some Irises (if they survive out of the ground a few more days!) around the utility boxes, but I ran out of weekend and energy for using the hoe. Here is a before picture with only two sections under the fence ready for planting and an after picture. I sure hope the Hostas root, and come back to life as they are pretty wilted still.

Before:After:

Here are some photos of the shrub bed before, during, and after re-bedding. I raked out the old mulch, laid down landscapers plastic (to help prevent weeds), and laid down black plastic edging to hold the mulch in the beds due to the way our land slopes. I did this to the two beds in the front of the house that the builder created.

Before:

During:
After:

I also planted four plants alternating white Snow Cap Spiderworts and Astilbes (red) on the side of the house by the garage, but I didn't establish beds and just planted them in the ground to see how they will grow. That side of the house is partial shade. If they grow well I'll probably make it into a garden and lay down some landscaping plastic and create a natural edge to the garden once our lawn is established. Our builder should be re-seeding our yard within a week. More adventures in gardening to come as we tackle planting our vegetable garden!

H