Yard and Garden Progress...

This morning I dug the cannas.  This sounds like a simple thing, but when you consider how thickly the cannas have grown in the last year and a half, you'll know it's not so simple.  Some of those poor babies had started trying to grow up under the deck.  How could I know they'd do so well here?  Hmph.

So we'll sell them (?) at the upcoming City-wide garage sale that Windcrest holds twice a year...at a dollar a bag, maybe some of my neighbors can take home a ton of these babies and we'll have red cannas all over town!  The hubs is not so happy--he loves the cannas all thick the way they are, but he knows they'll get that way again.  With any luck, I won't have to repeat this process for a couple of years.  (As to the extra wheelbarrow: one is new, the other is broken and on its way out...but, useful for now.)

In the front yard, we have a large section that is destined for desert landscaping.  By that I mean we'll lay down weedblock fabric, rock, and desert plants like yucca, cacti, century plants and sotol, etc.  Having gotten a little ahead of myself, I killed the grass across this section--last APRIL!!! So my poor neighbors have had to look at this dead corner all year.

Maybe we'll even get it rocked in by Christmas.  Who knows?  In the meantime, I bring extra dirt from other beds (and the canna dig) to give the topography a little interest.  We'll spread it out and add some different sized boulders here and there among the gravel and cacti.

It's funny how divided people are when it comes to an "interesting" yard like ours.  Of course, the ones who love it are very vocal with their approval, and those who get twitchy just looking at it...well, they're kind enough to refrain from comment.  

Looking out toward the stop sign corner...

The view from my front door.  Tennis courts across the street, and iris dreaming of Spring...in their newly revised beds.

I repainted the porch chairs--feeling the need for color lately.  So the matching Adirondacks where Schultz and I hang in the morning during Last Cup are now a cross between turquoise and sky, and the curb-side throwaway is now traffic cone orange, with odd bits of tracery or dots when I get a notion to put paint on something.  It happens.

See the baby crepe myrtle with her fall colors?  Her name is Zoe, and she will grow to 20 ft!  Someday.

Having moved so many times, I've never had a yard for more than a few years in a row...three full growing seasons is our record so far.  I wonder what this cobbled together garden will look like when we've had ten years in this place?  I look forward to seeing trees we planted actually get tall enough to give us shade.

Of course, then I'll have to find a new bed for the irises...

Hope your week is going well.
Jan
a.k.a. "that garden lady" as per the kids who walk past my house on their way to school...