Front door!

We've picked a front door color- Darkening Sky by Martha Stewart.

Of course, the forecast for tomorrow is 90 degrees. I hope I didn't already miss my painting window!

Houseplants

I scorched my poor African violet the other day. I thought it could use some sun so I put it out on the front porch for an afternoon.

Bad idea. I've heard it will recover, but it's amazing what 4 sunny hours can do:

It lead me to realize the important difference between a plant that needs full sun and one that needs "indirect bright light." I'm realizing that is probably what is going on here and I need to move this guy back indoors:

And maybe what is going on with my poor Aloe Vera?

Come on flowers!

These guys are coming along- hopefully we'll get some flowers soon.

Ranunculus:

Sunflowers. I need to weed and thin here:

The worst part of live oaks

It's that time of year again. Everything is covered in seed pods and there is a yellow film that just sort of exists - on the cars, on the patio furniture. Ugh. Can't wait until the trees are done.

Our patio:

Sidewalk:

No, not the center garden!

Gorman Falls

This weekend we drove about two hours northwest of Austin and went to Colorado Bend State Park. We parked and hiked about 3 miles round trip to Gorman Falls. Both the wildflowers on the way and the Falls were gorgeous!

We didn't take this picture, but a lot of the drive looked like this:

At the Falls- I think Grayson's face is really funny here. I'm not sure what he's thinking:

Finally!

I'm so excited to announce that the shade garden is D-O-N-E. Our backs are tired. Chuy escaped out the front gate (she's back). There were many Home Depot trips.

Andrew and I spent a few minutes just looking at it after we finished. I realized I wanted to take some pictures with my phone and I realized couldn't find my phone. Losing my phone is a pretty common occurrence but this time took longer than usual to find, so the pictures are from the next morning. Andrew has found my phone: in the garage, in the fridge, in the laundry, and this time: in a stack of Grayson's diapers in Grayson's room.

But back to the point. I'm so happy to check all these off my mental to do list:

1. Remove rock border
2. Find homes for rocks
3. Blow leaves out
4. Remove pebbles 
5. Research edging options
6. Stare at edging stones at Home Depot
7. Pick, purchase, and transport 68 stones
8. Dig a shallow trench for stones
9. Turn soil and remove weeds
10. Add mulch 
11. Add extra mulch on the low side to level the area 
12. Plant bulbs
13. Rejoice!

I planted hosta, Lily of the valley, and Astilbe. I have high hopes for the astilbe based on the wikipedia entry. That area gets water logged after rains, and the soil isn't amazing. Hopefully they will do well!

As Andrew said, there's not a lot that looks nicer than a freshly mulched area.

Tree Editing

We did a lot of work on the yard yesterday! Andrew cut down four little trees and trimmed up the two crepe myrtles. I moved pebbles from the shade garden. Getting closer!

Here's what we did.The trees in red are gone, the ones in yellow are trimmed. We weren't sure what type of trees they were, but they were small, growing into the live oaks, and had messy berries they dropped. No more!

The before:

The during:

All of them down...

And the after!

Chuy helped quite a bit. Her main responsibilities were barking at the leaf blower, getting in the way, and supervising the action. 

Rain

We had a lot of weather move through here Monday night. The estimate I saw on weather.com was 1.78 in.

We could see very easily Tuesday where the yard is low...I read we can either use a 50/50 sand/topsoil mix or compost. Good thing we have a barrel of compost we've been working on for almost a year!

Filling in the blanks

The front yard is looking good, in my opinion. Andrew mowed this weekend, and it is looking decent. Especially from this angle. I like the chairs, that the bridal wreath is blooming and the flowers are doing well. I added a pot of flowers in the center to give it some height. It has a lily and some sweet potato vine in it. I would like to add more color along the front, but I have a bigger problem.

First a close up...I like it!

This area in the front (and this is the after). That rock is centered on a big metal and stone utility something or other. It is only about 3 inches down, so there isn't a lot I can do there. I've planted some trailing verbena in hopes that it eventually grows over it. But there isn't a lot of color. You can see on the edge some Meixcan sage that is attempting to take over the whole area, which is nice, but green. That weird tree is growing, but I'm not sure what it is. 

I was encouraged that the verbena made it past last summer (and winter, I guess although that was less dramatic) so I got another one and put it on the other side of the tree. Maybe someday they will meet in the middle?

I also got two lantanas and planted them on the edges. Hopefully they will add a little color at this end?

I decided I didn't like any of the paint chips I had originally picked, so here is round 2.

Rocking it

Signs of life! I'm starting to see shoots pop up! I hope that means flowers are coming...

A close up:

I planted the Anaheims into the garden yesterday. You can't really see them, but they are behind the cilantro - We need to find more recipes that use cilantro! The tomatoes are doing well, and the basil is coming back. Something is eating my strawberries  though. 

I finally got the last of the pebbles out of the back triangle. The dump cart we got really makes it a lot easier. Whew. I started on the shade garden area, but realized it would be easier if I could blow the leaves out. Which I could only do if the rock border wasn't there. Since I don't like that rock border anyway AND something is eating my strawberries I decided it might be a better use of my time to move the rock border. I'm about 80% there.

I used it to make a border where the grass will stop (as if it's our idea for the grass not to grow under these trees). 

And to make it harder for bunnies to get in under our fence (and balls and dogs to get out).

The rocks border the west and north fence completely.Who knew there was that much around the trees?

I'm wondering if I can fill this area with rocks and make it the firepit area...I'm watching it to see how much sun it gets because maybe it could be another garden area?

Surprise

We bought a Big Green Egg! Andrew set it up Thursday, I bought lump charcoal Friday, and we are going to make an attempt at using it Sunday. The hope is that we can use this as a smoker (and that BIL Dan will share his turkey breast recipe), as an oven in the summer, to cook pizza, and a grill on occasion as well. We have a gas grill that is bigger, so I think that will remain our general griller, but we'll see.

Surprise flowers

I planted perennial flowers in the front yard last year. They didn't do very well because of the awful summer we had. This year they showed back up- I guess they weren't kidding about the perennial label!

Spoiler Alert: There are still pebbles in the wrong places

This weekend it rained from Friday mid morning to Sunday mid morning. It rained hard at some times, not so hard at others, but it was always raining. It was also chilly - in the 40s. Andrew left Friday morning to camp with some of his guy friends and didn't get back until Sunday afternoon.

Saturday right after lunch Grayson got sick. Poor kid had a really bad stomach bug. I had a sick kid that was barfing everywhere and I couldn't figure out what to do. He wanted to be with me, preferably in my arms. I understand that idea, but was running out of clean clothes and his room needed some clean up. Then, as we were sitting in an empty bathtub stripped down to our underwear hoping that the worst was over, the doorbell rang. The boy scouts were delivering mulch. I am willing to bet when I finally came down (clothed) that I appeared a little frazzled. Layne came over to watch him for a sec in the tub while I cleaned up his room and then I got him down for his nap.

It was a long day and night. Sunday I woke up and it was still raining, Grayson was still sick, and Chuy was trying to remind me she was still here.

Sunday afternoon the sun finally came out and Grayson's tummy calmed down. I took Chuy and Grayson to a dog friendly, kid friendly burger joint so they could see people that weren't Momma and Grayson could run off some of his new found energy. When we got back Andrew was home. He put Grayson down, I took a nice long bath, we caught up and then I went to sleep.

But the pebbles, the dang pebbles are still under the trees. 

Rain, rain, rain

It has been raining for over 24 hours now. We need it but there is a serious case of cabin fever around here...

Checklist update

Here's how I'm doing against my checklist:

1. Finish moving pebbles from the back triangle to the utility side of the house.

Hmm..not yet. Maybe today.

2. Move pebbles in shade garden to the other side of the house.

Again, not yet. Something about moving rocks hasn't appealed to me much...

3. Decide on a paint color for the door.

I have paint chips up, but no decisions yet. I'm not even sure I like any of these colors. I'm thinking.

4. Clean the patio furniture.

Done. It is supposed to rain for the next three days, so it might have to be done again. I got this stuff at Target on clearance last year and it's amazing for cleaning. Works super well!

5. Get some plants for my front porch pots.


Done!

6. Figure out a strategy for containing the shade garden.

I'm just going to use plastic landscape edging for a clean look. I've found some instructions here.


7. Power wash deck- if we can get a power washer!

We are thinking about hiring a neighborhood kid who appears to have a business going using his dad's power washer.

Vegetables I Planted

Anaheim Pepper Seedlings:

Cilantro is doing great! Tomatoes are along the back, and strawberries are still growing along the right hand side. 

Look different?

It may not look much different, but there are 70+ bulbs in there!

I turned the soil again, pulled the weeds, planted sunflower seeds along the back fence, ixia, ranunculus, dahlias, gladiolus, and alyssum. Now I just water and look anxiously for signs of life...

Porch Progress

With Andrew's parents arriving tomorrow, I thought I would focus on the front porch a little today. I got three little yellow pots several years ago after seeing this picture. I finally got a few more today!

Impatiens

Upstairs...

And some progress shots of the front: bridal wreath is blooming!

Flowers are doing well...

And a confession...I couldn't hold out and moved my tomatoes into the bed! The little pots are some Anaheim peppers that I moved from their seed starters into pots where they can grow a little more before they go in!