Weekend Gardening

I was so so happy that the weekend arrived and it was actually dry like they said it would be. I've had a great desire to be out working in the garden lately but by the time I get home on a weekday, the light is already going. I'm barely able to look around and see if work has been done on the house while I've been gone. But this weekend I was able to get out and do some work. Muddy work, but overall very satisfying.

For the past month or so I've been telling myself every time I go out to the garden that I'm going to get my pruners and chop down the big strand of blackberry bushes in the back corner of the yard but easily distracted as I am, I haven't so much as touched one of the canes despite going out 5 or 6 times since my resolution. This time I distracted myself with the mound of grass, weeds, and clay that I had heaped up in mid-summer to dig our solitary flower bed in the back of the garden.

Our flower bed has since expanded in both directions but the heap has remained. I thought it might naturally form a small hill once the rains started to come. Instead, it stubbornly remained a lumpy heap, which I have to admit I was actually quite sure would happen. You can kind of see it, lazing there in the picture below from mid-October.


Since the rains started, it has also started to sprout a new growth of weedy geraniums and grasses (luckily no oxalis, the bulbs must be buried deep). And since there was also a couple inches of original grass between it and the finished bed that have been trying to spread into our precious, clean flower bed, I decided to procrastinate on the berries, by hacking at the heap this weekend. Also, it's the low impact, easy on the muscles kind of gardening I especially like. So here it is, after picking it apart for two hours or so, it was finally a nicely manicured little hill behind the flower bed.


The lump was kind of resting against the bottom few inches of the fence for these 5 months so you can see the dark soaked wood behind it... I know, very bad of me, very unneighborly... but looking at it again on Sunday, dried out, it looks like that area of the fence is in no worse condition than the rest of it.

Also, sidenote - I cut out the two overgrown Coreopsis plants I had between the Agastache and Foxglove. I also cut down the Agastache and harvested the seeds a week ago. I don't know if the Coreopsis will come back, it might, the roots look very healthy, but if they do I'll move them to a new place. The Agastache and Foxgloves next year should be enough for that part of the bed.

And so, Sunday! Having conquered the heap, I decided I must now use it like I originally planned to. Now, the lighting is pretty bad but here:


That's a very well shaped, at least I thought so, Ceanothus 'Dark Star' sitting on top of the heap. I've always wanted to plant one in the back garden, so this is what I was thinking when I originally made the heap. I've read that a little additional water in the summer can be good for it but that too much can kill it and that it needs to be in well drained soil, so I think it will do well there. Also once it expands into a small tree, it will go very well with the two roses in front and next to it. While the roses are cut down and resting for the winter, the Ceanothus should be in full bloom, winter to spring. Then as it turns into a normal evergreen shrub after the bloom, the roses will take over.

And so the back flower bed is starting to take proper shape. I want most of the plants in the top of the yard to need little water: Agastache, Lavender, and Ceanothus. This next year, I plan to add native wildflowers and shrubs, a pergola and wisteria, a redbud, a Black Oak, and a large dry space in the middle with Decomposed granite or something similar.

There are already two trees in the back of the garden: a deciduous magnolia and an ornamental lemon. While I was lazing about in between weeding this weekend, I stared off into space in the tree's general area and noticed that a few of the blossoms are starting to open!


There are three or four buds nearly ready to open. In fact, I checked again briefly last night and this bud had open about 2 1/2 inches at the top. I'm glad to see that the drought stress inflicted on it during probably the last 5 years hasn't injured it too much. Last year, I saw beautiful blossoms in March, when I first saw the house, but forgot to take pictures so I still don't know what type of magnolia this is. Once I get some fully opened blossoms I'll probably be able to finally identify it. At first, we weren't sure if we'd want to keep the magnolia, as it isn't in the best of shape but I think if it survives our restorative pruning, we'll keep it. What do I mean? Well here are the biggest problems with the tree:


One of these took care of itself (kinda?). The lower rotted limb just fell off when I touched it one time. It did leave a rotted hole in the trunk like the one in the middle of the picture though. Obviously there used to be a branch there, where it went nobody knows. Then, there's the crossing branch in between the two main trunks. We finally bought a reciprocating saw this weekend, via Craigslist ($50! At home depot, the exact same one for $149.99) so we took care of that and a couple of crossing branches above. What to do about the rotting holes, no clue...

But on the subject of trees and pruning, we did something else this weekend that is probably... not so good... So our Lemon tree! Wonderful lemons, even last week we picked two for cooking, but the body of the tree is about beyond repair. Originally it looked like this from one angle:


After some basic pruning, there was this:


And as we didn't have a reciprocating saw yet, we left some stumps on the tree to clean up later. This Sunday, we started at it. Sawing off those bits first and the ends of some rather less stable look limbs and branches that shot off into the canopy 6 feet... and we kinda... didn't stop.... By the end of the day we had this:


Now, we didn't just go crazy with saw rage. Patrick and I were talking it through, trying to find what was best for the tree... But all we could conclude is that no matter what cuts we make, if we thin out the canopy and cut the ends of branches to promote stronger growth, there would still be a very unstable base structure. For example, the front right branch we cut off extended another 4 feet out from the trunk at a very low angle and then had a very heavy canopy depending on it. If we cut back just the top growth of that limb, it would grow back and become thicker and heavier than before, eventually causing the limb to snap at the trunk. So we cut it to short enough a length that the limb, at that angle, should still be able to support new growth year after year. We had to do the same for two other limbs... obviously...

The final step will be to commit the biggest pruning sin ever... topping the tree... We're planning on cutting it just below the horrible knot you can see if you look closely at the second picture I posted. As this is a citrus tree, something that is very often pruned hard, and it's already in very bad condition, I think this is the only way to help it. I can't be sure what the previous owners did to this tree over the years, but I think it was topped before right where that knot has formed. I think as long as I carefully thin the new growth, selecting the branches growing in the best directions, I think it will become better than before. It has to, heh.

So, it will be topped.

Walls and a Tiny Window

The shell has now been covered up in a mix of the old and new siding and everything is nearly complete with the garage.

I would say it is all just in time for the rain but the roof is still just bare boards. But then, I know Abel is at the site right now working on the french drain across the property and he promised he'd get the roof at least waterproofed, if not finished, by the weekend.

So there's the big update, all finished. We also have nice big flowers around the place - the Salvia Leucantha now has long purple flowers and that first rose we transplanted is now in full bloom mode.

The roses are definitely more yellow and pink this time around, maybe next year they'll have the red orange tones I loved from before we transplanted it. On the plus side, the flowers seem bigger and healthier than they did earlier in the year. Compare the first two new pictures to the last one, I swear that they're the same rose and these pink-yellow guys aren't coming from suckers, not possible.

Lastly, to perhaps make myself find some time Saturday to dig more in the front yard, here is a picture of the sad little plants waiting to go there.

New Growth

Going out last night to take some pictures around the backyard, I found that two new plants were starting to bud up. These are two that came with the house, that we cut down to ground level just after the house was officially ours - so two months ago. Since then they've grown like crazy to about 2 1/2 feet high and 3 feet wide. Here's one of the many buds forming on the Salvia Leucantha.

This guy was just a tiny, scraggly little thing when we first got to it because of the towering oleander just next to it, depriving it of sunlight and any moisture in the ground. But since cutting all the pathetic little bits off it above ground and watering about 3 times a week for the past two months, it's become a beautiful, if flowerless, mass of shrub.

As to the Oleander next to it, this is a light pink double flowers one that looked just pathetic when we came round. I gave Patrick the okay to chop it down right away but when he gave up trying tot remove the large stump, I decided to try watering it, pretty sure that a shrub as vigorous as an oleander would be coming back.

I'm very happy with the way both of these have bounced back, much healthier than before. So much so that I also finally got the big loppers out and cut down the Hibiscus next to them. Ever since then though, I've been thinking each time I look at it that I should cut the old branches a bit closer to the ground. I'm so lazy. But I'm seeing new growth on it already regardless.

On to the back of the yard, the small bed that we dug out at the beginning of the month keeps getting bigger. The original plants have easily doubled in size and I transplanted a rose there about a month and a half ago, just before we moved in. As a result of which it dried up in its first few days and lost all its leaves after about three weeks. It was completely my fault so I, in shame, never mentioned it on the blog again. But in the past two weeks, it has started to come back to life so I'll no longer hide my pictures of it.

It really does have the most beautiful leaves of all the eleven roses we got with the house. I'm so glad I didn't kill it. Actually, even if I'd killed it, I have one more. We noticed also about two weeks ago that there was a sprout growing up out of the hole we left when we moved the rose. Somewhere down there a very persistent root decided to grow even though I never watered it. It's getting the water it wants now though and who knows, it might be true to its parent.

In addition, I already showed a picture of the place we moved the next rose transplant from, from in front of the garage to the back of the yard. Here's a picture of it, two days after the move. I trimmed of the wilty ends off the canes the night after the transplant and while the leaves still feel a bit like lettuce left out too long, I think this second night it looks a bit better. Or at least better than the other rose did after transplanting.

So that's on the left side of the planting bed, next to where we'll have a pergola eventually. On the right side, I have planted about 20 Tall Irises which I hear from our neighbor, might be blue. This weekend, I finally got to digging up and dividing the ton of Irises that had come under the fence into our yard over the past decade. After getting through the planting, it was so dark that I didn't take any pictures, but I swear, three days later, the new little blades have grown longer.

And yes, I am aware that I have planted them waaaay to close together, but that's just me, I'll dig them up again next spring when they're choking each other again and move them around the yard. I find that I always plant things too close together. Just take a look at a photo of the full planting bed.

The Coreopsis are taking over everything. The Geum is growing into the Coreopsis. The baby foxgloves will probably be slowly covered over by the Coreopsis. And once that sheared lavender comes back it will be pushing against the Agastache. But that's okay, for me, a crowded garden makes me happy. And I don't mind digging up the plants again and again to move them when they get to full size.

And while I'm showing you a full picture of this bed, take a look at this picture from July 26 - just a month and a half ago. Told you, they've doubled in size - at least.

The only other thing I can really talk about in our still very untended yard is our lemon tree. During the month before we moved into the house, we harvested just about all the healthy yellow citrus from the tree but I can now see tons of new lemons, already bigger than the lemons you get in the store and still green.

I finally bought a fruit picker this last weekend and did my best to get all the fruit that has been dive bombing the potted shade plants I put under the lemon tree. In the process I got a sack-full of good lemons and we made some lemonade. I think we're growing attached to this tree.

Grand Entrance

It's taken a bit longer than we originally thought, but finally our front porch is starting to look like a porch.

Our little house started with an understated and after nearly a hundred years, an unstable and leaning porch but now its nearly transformed into the grand entry our restored old beauty deserves. Not to brag but we took a close look up and down the street after we looked over the stairs and our house definitely has the best looking stairs on the street (will have the best looking front when Abel's finished). We actually had three people stop and talk in front of our house about the new stairs on Sunday. Oh, it made me giddy but I'm a naturally shy person so I sunk down on the couch so that they wouldn't see me and told Patrick about them. Of course, he then decides to go out and talk so I got the courage to go out too. The house is finally starting to look like it's inhabited and being cared for. Makes me so happy. So happy, I'll give you a few more pictures and even advertise for my contractor in one.

Anyway, once the men are finished with the porch, it should be safe for us to begin working on the front garden. I was so eager to start that when I went to Home Depot this weekend, I bought a couple of plants. I think we'll start at the concrete pad in the very front and put some of the larger landscaping stones from the backyard extending in a line out from the first step, marking out what will be the front bed and creating a tiny retaining wall. Then I'll plant the two new plants I bought around there (don't remember their names yet) along with my Fortnight Lily, Salvias, and Nemesias. Then from that first step we'll put in two paths to either side of the yard, in some kind of stepping stones. Anyway, I could write more, but it really needs pictures, so I 'll move on.

Also on Sunday, we prepared the area around the garage for the work that will start there probably next weekend. There were two roses in front of the fence, horribly placed and sure to get trampled so with Patrick's help, the healthier one was moved to the back yard.

As you can see, the fence didn't survive the move. It was quite amusing actually, Patrick literally lifted the fence panels out of the ground and they didn't resist in the least. Now Our backyard is open... but then again the little latch shouldn't have really deterred anyone. About the rose, I check on it yesterday night and of course, it was very wilted. But unlike with the last rose I moved (which is growing again, yay!), I gave this one a haircut, taking off all the wilty ends of the branches so hopefully, it will be able to hold onto some of its leaves while it settles in.

Work Begins Again

Finally, yesterday we had workmen at the house again. I don't think I mentioned it but we've had a break in construction and almost nothing has happened since we moved in at the beginning of the month. The problem was with Prospect Mortgage - even after we finally got through closing, they held us up again. They were selling our mortgage but I guess needed a full month to dress it up nice and pretty so that Bank of America would take it. Then, Prospect doesn't service FHA 203k Renovation loans like ours, only make them, so we weren't able to get any money for our contractor until after the sale and the two weeks processing time for B of A. But last Thursday we received the check for the nearly $30,000 our contractor was waiting for and we are all happy again.

On Monday, the men started work on the new porch for the front. Here's a picture of what we've had for the past month.

And here we are this morning.

They'll be pouring concrete into the forms today, I think, and according to Abel, we may even have stairs and a platform in front of our door by the weekend. Other work they did yesterday included moving some electrical switches to above-counter positions for when we have a proper kitchen and refitting the bathroom door. And, yes, it was awkward when family visited one afternoon two weekends ago. But we have the door now. I tried taking a shower with it shut and the fan on yesterday for the first time and I've seen much steamier rooms after a shower. The mirror was even usable.

Then, as for the garden - I have finally found my camera charger so I'll give you some updates. I'm not sure what day it was exactly but just before we moved into the house, I'll just say on 7/25, I planted a flat of new seeds. I kept forgetting to take pictures so you get to see them a month into growing. The seeds I ordered are all fast growing perennials so hopefully I can have them all flowering throughout the yard next spring. First, a picture of the little sprout, then the advertised plant:

Gazania Daybreak

I don't "love" Gazania but I'm giving them a chance. They're supposed to grow like crazy but not spread much so I think they'll be a good first stage plant even if I don't keep them. My parents have two of them so I know they're fast and very tough.

Lavender Lady

My third type of Lavender, hopefully they turn out as pretty as the pictures. I only have one type of lavender blooming right now and it's not the type I like, I'll probably get rid of it once the others start blooming.

Catmint Blue Carpet

Oh I can't wait for the blooms on these, such a beautiful blue. Stiggy might even like them, I get so many conflicting descriptions - some say Catmint isn't actually attractive to cats and some say it is. Regardless, this one I'll be carefully splitting into tons of plants, I want them all over the garden.

Festuca Glauca

These are one of my favorites - they need very little water, have a beautiful color, and very pretty seedheads. I planted one in my father's yard four years ago and we split it this summer into about 15 little ones.

Lambs' Ears
Ever since Patrick first saw this plant at the UC Botanical Garden, he's loved it. I can't think of another plant that he has really said he loved so I had to grow these for him. I love them too, they have the softest velvety leaves and they take almost no water.

Roman Chamomile

I just love the smell of chamomile and apparently ants do to, as they were swarming all over my hands when I split one of the pots last week.

I have all the little seedlings in little 3 or 4 inch pots in large rectangular flats out on the patio. They get pretty much full sun so they're all growing so much faster and looking much more healthy than the seeds I started at the condo. I just add water to the flat every two or three days and they don't seem to need anything. I'll just have to split them up soon into more pots so they don't strangle each other.

And now, I know the post has had too many pictures, but I have to add a couple very pretty shots of new roses we have in the garden. We're neither of us rose people but we bought so many established ones with the house that I'm trying to rehabilitate them. Everything else is weeds so these roses make me quite happy.