Changes on the South Side

So, we've been making some progress over on the south side of our yard.  If you aren't currently aware of the state of things over there, go check it out.  It's a little bit scary.  And shameful.

Here's a picture of how things looked last week:

Aaahhh... intimidating.  But it's only the beginning.  We are slowly making progress toward my vision of a cool little retreat.  As a way to keep track of what I'd like to do in this space, I've put together a modest list of some of the things I'd like to accomplish this season.  I've titled it...

My Modest List of Humble Endeavors:

(with reference photos)

1. Plant that orange tree.
 
Done!

2. Get rid of those awful weeds.
 
I worked on this today.  It was hard.  I worked for an hour and a half, all big and pregnant and sweaty    (there's a real image for ya), and looking at the pictures, you can't really tell the difference.  But consider that I mainly picked up a layer of sticks all over the yard and raked up a bunch of dead leaves and grass that had been covering everything.  Later this week, I'll get on actually pulling out a lot of the weeds.  I might do some research about weed and feed to see if this might be an appropriate option for me.  I'm such a novice.  If anyone out there knows a bit more than I do about gardening, and has any sage advice, I'd love to hear it.

Oh, and remember this yucca?

Well, right next to him were these giant weeds that had grown into small trees.  We dug those out of the ground yesterday.  And we also found something else: lillies!  I had no idea that we had lillies growing in our yard -- I love them!  And they kind of have some sentimental value to us because I decorated our entire wedding with lillies.  I carefully dug them out and replanted them yesterday in the back yard... which is an even bigger mess than the south side right now.  But now it's a mess that has some lillies!

Anyway, here's what this area looks like all cleared out.  I'd love to build a little house around the AC unit that you see there, but for now, I'm just so happy that those giant weedy trees are gone.

3. Encourage the pitiful grass that we have left to grow and fill in with weed and feed and watering.  If that doesn't work, we'll have to go to plan B.  I don't know what plan B is, yet.  This is a fly-by-the-seat-of-my- pants sort of operation.

4. Build vegetable frames, one or two of them.  If you look at the picture above, I'd like to build the frames right about where the bottle brush is standing.  Oh, and we talked to our neighbors, and they'd love to have this tree, so we won't have to kill it after all.  That does make me feel a little better... I was feeling slightly guilty over killing off a tree that's sort of thriving.  Or could be, with decent care.

5. Plant some veggies.

6. Take out the lava rocks and turn this part of our yard into a real flower bed.  Man, I hate those lava rocks.

7. Arrange the tree trunk stepping stones.

8. Add some sort of seating... benches... something.

9. Oh, and have a baby at some point in the middle of all of this.  Since I probably won't be done by June.

10. Enjoy the fruits (get it? Fruits!  ...because we're planting a veggie garden...) of my labor.

Thanks for reading!
Sarah

The South Side

So, let me preface this post by saying that I am more than a little embarrassed to show you these photos.  This is not one of my finer moments.

The south side of our yard is absolutely the sunniest spot.  The absence of large trees and the giant open space make it a great place to do some real gardening...the only problem is, I'm not a gardener.  

Or I wasn't.  I've always just excused my lack of plant cultivation by saying that I have a brown thumb, but last year I put that excuse to the test.  I planted five new plants in my yard: a basil, some chives, red and orange hibiscus, elephant ear, and a philodendron.  Of those, all of them survived the winter except the basil -- but I didn't bring him inside.  Besides, my mom told me that, until this year, all her basil plants have died every year and she just gets a new one the following spring.  So, all in all, not too bad.  

The hibiscus plants are thriving, and before the blooming season ended last fall, they were gorgeous -- an explosion of red and orange.  The philodendron is also doing very well, despite the fact that I have him in a shadier spot (everything I've read says that they should be in sunnier locations).  And the elephant ear is also doing well.  Whenever I leave the house to go somewhere, I always inspect these guys, and I get so excited when I see new leaves uncurling.  It's actually pretty fun to plant stuff.  They're like my little green babies. 

But I'm not as proud of the south side of my yard.  This is why:

But wait, there's more:

...and...

Weed city.  With little dirt patch suburbs.  And a hodge podge of wimpy or sickly looking plants that would earn me more than one stern lecture from any semi-serious gardener.  Here, let me show you.

There're the sorry little sego palms:

The poor and discolored sea grapes:

The scrubby little yucca:

And the scrawny bottlebrush, with my one bloom so far.  At least that one bloom is very nice.

And the star of this little show is my Valentine's gift this year.  I still love her, and I especially love her because she's the one plant that looks well cared for:

My baby orange tree!  And look:

Orange blossoms!

I'm proud of those blossoms.  They weren't there when Dave gave me the tree last month, so it must mean that we're doing something right.  Stick an orange tree in the sun and give it plenty of water, and I guess she'll be all right.

Anyway, back to the problem at hand.  I really don't like to be in the south side of our yard right now.  In fact, it's pretty easy to ignore.  We have a ranch style house, very long, and if you wanted to, you could easily forget that it's even over there.  

Except that a few weeks ago, we put the playset right beside it, so now I have to look at it every single day. And it's given me the itch to do something about it.  

Nat Nat really wants us to grow a vegetable garden.  We have a great little book called Growing Vegetable Soup, by Lois Ehlert, that we read often around here:

It's given the girl some ideas.  And me, too.  

I want some planter boxes.  And I want to do this:

This sweet little set up is from a great blog called Domesticated Nomad.  I found that picture via Pinterest months ago and I can't get it out of my head.    That's why I asked Dave to cut up a tree trunk for me, and guess what?  He did!

Hmmm...looking at the picture again, I can see that I'll need a lot more tree trunk stepping stones.  I'll have to work on that.  

The rest of my plan for the south side of my yard includes removing the bottlebrush.  Very sorry little guy, but you are disappointing to say the least, and you're soaking up way too much sun.  I also want to find an appropriate spot to plant the orange tree.  Somewhere on the side of things, but still in the sun.  And I want to leave a large space in the middle for us to have our vegetable garden.  I'm not sure what I want to plant yet, but probably the usual variety of stuff.  I know that I want kale -- I've been making kale chips a lot lately, and they are so yummy...mmmm....I could go for some right now, in fact.  

Thanks for reading!
Sarah

Our F-R-E-E Playground!

Don't you just love free things?  I sure do -- it makes having something (that you really wanted anyway) all the more satisfying.

A couple of weeks ago, a friend of ours mentioned wanting to get rid of this playset that was in the backyard of the house he and his wife just bought.  Dave and I had been talking recently about wanting to get just such a set for our kiddos, but they are so expensive.  We talked about the possibility of making one ourselves, but after adding up the cost of the wood and the purchase of things like the swings, we decided that it would be just as cost-effective to buy one.  So, when Dave heard that this friend of ours no longer wanted his, he offered to buy it from him.

A couple days after that, Dave got an email -- an offer to just have the playset, if Dave was willing to come, take it apart, and haul it away himself.  Hello!  Done.

So, last week, on Natalie's birthday in fact, Dave did just that.  And the next day, we put the thing together.

The kids were so excited.  They kept playing in the slide (you can see it in the background -- its green).  At one point, they were pretending that it was a boat and were rowing along.  And they really wanted to help.

Daniel started the helping game:

But Natalie quickly joined in.  Oh, and you'll notice that she's still wearing her Tangled costume.  Go Nat Nat for not being afraid to work with tools in a dress.

My dad came over to help set it up.  Dave said later that he would not have been able to put it together by himself.  Thank you Dad!

My amazing and handsome husband doing the dirty work:

After they set up most of it, we went inside for lunch.  Daniel does this cute thing where, when we announce that lunch is coming, he'll immediately go to sit in his chair, even if we haven't begun to prepare it.  I captured him as he waited for his food.

Sleepy boy!

One more:

It's been so nice to have this playground.  They've played on it every day since we've had it (except for a few rainy days here and there) and it never ceases to entertain them.  Such a huge blessing for us, because we probably couldn't have afforded to buy one any time soon.

I'll have to take some after pics of the completed playground (and the kiddos loving it!) and post them for you guys in a few days.

Thanks for reading!
Sarah