It was time to put in irrigation to water everything that had been planted so far. You can see that we have laid the larger 1″ hose for the main irrigation line that will service the trees. This line is connected to the larger 2″ PVC line which is buried 12″ down. Dragging around the hose is just too much work, and takes too much time.
We also began to plan out delineating the boundaries of the lawn. We saw an example of concrete edging at the home and garden show, so we looked into what that would cost and decided to go ahead and splurge on edging for the lawn spaces, north and south.
You can see the orange paint on the dirt, outlining where the concrete edging will be laid. You can also see in this picture the flat stones were purchased to be used as steps down from the level of the front yard, to the lower level of the south willow garden.
The house was built on top of the ground, due to the high water table here, so there is a 6′ difference in level from the front door to the south side of the property.
The willow garden is being created, day lilies have been planted along the edge, sand cherries and Russian sage. We put in a bird feeder so we can watch the birds out the south dinning room bay window. Looking down the pathway to the west end of the property you can see that the west berm has been installed and the cupola has been placed and anchored into the ground.
Meanwhile in the front yard, the new hedges have been planted around the entire driveway. After I measured the spacing and determined that I needed 200 hedge shrubs – I had a complete conniption fit! No way could I afford to buy that many shrubs, not to mention, no one locally had that many. I called and called with no luck. Then I stumbled upon a nursery out of state that had saplings. So in desperation I decided to give it a try. They arrived in a single plastic bag. The saplings were 18″ tall and 1/8″ diameter little twigs. I shook my head, but I went ahead and planted them with help from my friends Robin and Mary. It took all day. I remember the look on my neighbors faces as I crawled around on my knees with my ruler, meticulously measuring the distance between each shrub and the distance from the driveway edging.
I enlarged the picture so you can actually see the saplings. Daily watering was required, but they made it.
Dear Mark.
My good friend Mark Johnson died this year, along with one of his two daughters. The whole thing was tragic. His second daughter delivered some of his, and his daughter’s ashes to me one afternoon following his memorial service. She said Mark had asked to have his ashes buried on my property. So I purchased an oak tree, (as he was a Druid and Oaks are sacred to them) and buried his and his daughter’s ashes under it.
I planted the oak in the North, which is the most sacred direction to the Druids and next to the Womb of Earth, for all things come from the Mother, and all things return. I drove his athame into the ground with the oak tree to delineate the site as sacred.
The piano harp marks the space where the butterfly garden will be created. Mark’s oak is in front of the north berm, right behind the harp. Now, there are 4 new evergreens on the north berm, Austrian Black Pines, Brian’s Mother, Judy, bought them for us as a gift to our new home when she moved here from Albuquerque.
Also, in front of the harp is a ditch which is being dug for drainage from the south side of the property, which is higher, to the north side, and off the property into the drainage ditch that surrounds the entire property. In 2005 we had a massive downpour and all the water ran into the middle of the garden where the herb garden was being built. Luckily, this happened when the herb garden was just the bottom rows of the structure. The water settled and sank the septic tanks about 2′, making a giant hole in the middle of the herb garden. We had to rip it out and Morrison Homes had to come out and lift the tanks back up, and mud jack tons of dirt back under the tanks to get them back to level. OMG – I thought I was going to loose my mind, it was such a disaster. Anyway, so we are digging a drainage ditch!
All the little marks in the ground are holes being dug to plant 4000 crocus, 2000 on each side of what will be the lawn. This project took me an entire week on my hands and knees. I can’t wait to see them bloom next spring.
Progress on the Herb Garden.
It’s amazing how fast herbs recover. They got dug up, put in pots, over-wintered across town in pots covered with straw, and then replanted into the new herb garden last fall. I’m thrilled at how well they did this first year.
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