House (Garden) Update: Last Weekend, Part 2

Seeing the snow on the ground really brought home how much more I would have liked to have done before winter hit.

How the yard and garden looked last Saturday:


I started to shovel this, but then decided that sweeping was more appropriate. There was some ice underneath. I chipped away a bit, and then decided I needed to get grit or salt for the winter, to avoid potential lawsuits.

The sour cherry finally decided it was time to drop its leaves:


*sigh*... I wanted to divide the perennials in this garden... move some to the back, and spread these out a bit. They're too crowded:

Or, if not that, at least clean up the old growth so that I don't have to do it when it's all moldy in the spring.

Another spot that needs the tops chopped off:

Plus dividing, digging up the weed roots, etc.

The plum had also finally dropped its leaves, however, it did it *before* (or during?) the snow:


Perennials that need planting:


Dang tree where I want to put the perennials, still standing:

(I've been busy.)

Blackberries that need training, plus a weedy area I need to deal with:


Trash can full of irises, plus a day lily from the front garden, just plopped on *top* of the ground.

(I've got enough so that if this one doesn't survive, it's not the end of the world. I had been planning to plant it behind the fence in the back lane, until I discovered there was only an inch of dirt there before I hit a concrete block... and decided to leave the concrete block where it was.)

The "back forty" (I think I picked up calling it that from Crazy Aunt Purl) that needs to be worked into a proper vegetable garden bed:


Oooo... cool stuff:

The compost bin has dropped a foot. Not sure if that's just settling, or if there's composing going on. (Hoping for the latter, but it may be the former.) After this photo, I stirred it and added more leaves. It dropped another foot since then, and so it got another stir, plus leaves and jack-o-lantern pieces. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

What did I end up accomplishing last Saturday?

I raked the leaves in the front lawn:

(Raking leaves on snow is odd.) I didn't try to do a really good job, just went for the areas that had more leaves... I wasn't interested in clearing all the snow, after all. ;)

I pruned the plum tree:

I cut off the really low branch that bothered me, trimmed any branches I found that were crossing or broken, plus some that were too high up.

I also shifted some concrete blocks that were annoying because they made my parking spot shorter:

(They're on both the left and right sides of this photo... this is the "after" shot, taken the next day because it had gotten too dark for decent photos. They had been immediately in front of my car's bumper, stacked just tall enough that the bottom of my bumper would hit them.)

I stuck my garden lights in random locations where the ground was soft:


(I'll spread them out and put them in better places next year... for now, they're not cluttering up the inside of the house.)

And, after it was dark (doh!), I got three perennials planted:


There was no gardening on Sunday... I helped mom at her art show that day.

House (Garden) Update: Last Weekend

A week ago Friday I was somewhat concerned about how gardening was going to work out that weekend, given that my yard looked like this on Friday morning:


Saturday morning, I needed to run an errand before I started gardening: I needed to fetch my bank card from the bank whose ATM I left it in the weekend prior... dang thing was probably the farthest possible branch from my home. (It was, however, convenient on my way home from the retreat.) And no, they wouldn't let my mom pick it up for me, despite the fact that she would be driving past it nearly every day that week. *sigh*

On my way home, I stopped in at the Old House Revival Company to look for a cover for a cold air return in my house. The original cast iron cover had broken at some point, and my dad had replaced it with three plastic ones:

These ones did *not* feel like they should be stood on, particularly the one in the middle. In preparation for shopping, in addition to taking measurements, I also took photos of the other covers in the house. Plain one in the front entryway:

Another one in the living room:

(Yes, that's an electrical outlet down there, no I don't know why it's there.) Third floor cover:

(Yes, all of these are slightly out of focus... my apologies. Low light, and I had switched off "high ISO" on the recommendation of someone else. "high ISO" is now back on.)

I found one that was either the right size or a smidge small, but it was cracked in several places and missing a corner, plus was quite rusty. There were several that were a smidge too big, with this one being the smallest and best condition:

Success! Not only that, but I found some *really* pretty covers for the wall cold air returns that have been swallowing my belongings ever since I was a child:

(Yeah, I need to remove the bits of paint, but other than that they're in perfect condition.) I spent a small fortune on these three covers, but I *like* them, they're appropriate for the house, functional, and not badly priced compared to some of the prices I've seen on the web. (Plus, this way there's no shipping of a heavy metal object!)

Up next: "before" photos.

Sometimes it sucks to be a girl

Went to Sears today to shop for bras.

Back story: several years ago, I found the perfect bra. Cotton, comfortable, fit great, underwire that matched my contours... and $8. After testing it, I went back to the store to buy a week's worth, and discovered the dang things had been discontinued. I bought as many in my size as I could find: six total. (Together with some other bras I had, that gave me enough for just over a week.) Given how much I liked them, and how much I disliked bra shopping, I kept them long past when I really should have. I even patched them, to make them last longer. Then the underwire broke in one bra. (It hurts when it happens while you're wearing it... at least, it does until you figure out why there's something sharp scratching you.) Yesterday an underwire in another bra expired. (Came out in the wash, poked itself out of a hole in the drum, and got quite mangled plus an end broke off.) No longer having enough for a week, plus one for wash day, I had to bite the bullet and go shopping. I chose Sears because I had recently discovered their bra prices were better than Zellers, plus they aren't going out of business any time soon as far as I know.

Bonus: Sears had a sale going on, and nearly all of their bras were marked down.

I found two bras I thought might work. One was *not* on sale plus was at the upper end of their price range (figures), the other was on clearance... but that means that I'll never find more if I decide I like it. *sigh*

I *hate* bra shopping.

Art!

I made it out to the art club tonight! Yay!

You may remember, a while ago some friends and I went up to Sheeples. We got a bit lost on the way, and found this gorgeous marsh:

I thought this photo would make a nice painting, and be a fun one to do with the palette knife. Tonight I finally started the painting:

As you can see, I still have a ways to go. (Both with the painting in general, and with getting the palette knife to do what I want.) However, I had fun! (Despite the struggle I had with the wimpy easel.)

I also used lots of paint... I'll have to put a high price on this one, given how much paint I'm going through already! (I hope it turns out!)

Progress... Slow, But Still Progress...

Well, I didn't actually manage to make it into the garden this weekend, so instead here are some photos of what I accomplished previously:

Okay, technically this wasn't in the garden, but it is progress. I'm not sure if I posted the mess it was before, but it is indeed a vast improvement. More of the crap boxes will be going in recycling, but I had filled the bin last week, and so needed to wait until this week before putting more in. (Which I haven't done yet, but I have until Tuesday night.)

Yeah, I posted about this before, but I feel this shows how much dirt I threw around last weekend.

One thing I did accomplish this weekend:

I converted two small pumpkins into four cups of puree for my grandma to use for pie, plus pumpkin seeds for me (I was going to share with co-workers, but there aren't many left after snacking tonight), and pumpkin skin and glop for the compost pile! :) I also made an impressive mess... thank goodness for dishwashers! (There's a few handwash items I need to do, but the kitchen is mostly back to normal.)

Although Saturday was a perfect day for being in the garden (cool, sunny, not winter), I spent the daylight hours running around shopping, and getting stuck in football traffic. (Whoops... note to self: check schedule before planning to be anywhere near the stadium!) However, I did buy some gardening tools I need, plus a replacement light fixture for outside the back door (the old one died... not sure if it's the motion sensor or timer, but it died).

Next weekend is a retreat, so no gardening then either. I've got my fingers crossed that winter keeps holding off!!! (Perhaps things will slow down a bit at work, and I can used some banked time for a gardening day.)

I'm making progress inside too. Not as fast as I'd like, but I'm only one person. (I have to keep reminding myself of that!)

Me vs. The Dead Tree

The dead tree:



1. Gather tools. (Gloves, garden fork, axe, hoe, lawn edger, loppers, shovel, bag of small gardening tools, rake, broom.) Now, I didn't expect to necessarily need all of those, but I gathered everything I had (plus the axe and loppers which I had borrowed the other week from my mom) so that I wouldn't have to go fetch something, which would put me in danger of getting distracted by another task that needs doing.

2. Pull weeds that were coming up again in the area. Luckily they were far from having seed heads (not even flower buds), so I added them to my compost pile... "greens" to mix with the "browns" (leaves)! Yay!

3. Expose roots. Looking at my array of tools, I decided to start with the hoe. Normally the fork is my favourite digging tool, but it would just get bent whenever I ran into a root. I ended up using the hoe very much like an adze... the ground was so solid, the chopping motion would give me some purchase, and then I'd pull the loosened chunk towards me. My hoe is awesome. I bought it for one or two dollars at an estate sale, and it is *solid*, and has all the right angles!

4. Toss random bits of non-organics exposed by my digging into the trash bucket or dad's junk pile: broken glass(!), chunks of concrete, bricks, plastic, metal, rocks, five foot long metal pipe, firewood (organic, but doesn't belong in a garden), tin foil... sheesh. These finds did amuse me:


5. Take breaks as needed. Sometimes I just stopped for some water, sometimes I did a different task... like rake and sweep the area around the trash cans and back gate, where leaves and pine needles had accumulated. All pretty again:

Or rake up the leaves that were accumulating where my property meets the back lane:

My leaf pile is growing:


6. Chop smaller roots that are making it difficult to expose the big roots. (I didn't want to chop the supporting roots until I knew I could finish the job, since I didn't want it to fall over when I wasn't there.)

By the time I had to stop, this is where I got to:


At this point, I'd like to say something: "Ow."

Monday is a holiday (Canadian Thanksgiving), but they're forecasting rain, so I probably won't be able to continue this until next weekend. Given how much I ache, I'm not complaining that much.

I bought a come-along on the way to my dad's for dinner, in case the tree is still stubborn even after I start chopping its roots.

When I was talking to dad about my efforts to remove the dead tree, he explained why he had left it up: He used it to prop the ladder against so that he could spray the still-living tree. Hm. I want to save the still-living tree, but I also want the dead one gone, so that I can make the garden nice. I'll figure out something else when it comes time to care for the still-living tree.

To do:
1. Chop through roots.
2. Pull tree over.
3. Dig soil (mix organics into clay, remove roots from dead tree, but try not to disturb roots from living tree).
4. Plant perennials.

Snow, please hold off for a while longer! (Especially since I have other gardens to tend to as well!) *sigh*

Treading Water

I raked the lawn today. I will probably need to rake again next weekend, since the leaves haven't finished falling... however, since it was snowing horizontally two days this week, I figured I had better rake before the snow starts sticking!

I slept late today... and even after I woke up, I didn't want to *get* up, what with the radio saying it was 1 C outside. (And not terribly warm inside... I've turned the heat on, but not very high.) It was much nicer under the covers. However, eventually I did get up, get dressed, and started working in the yard.

Today I did a pretty good job at remembering both before and after photos.

Rhubarb patch, before:


Rhubarb patch, after:


"Greens" for my compost bin:


Southerners, who have to pay money for rhubarb in the grocery store, might be rather shocked at me composting all that rhubarb... but this patch apparently doesn't produce very good rhubarb (I'm not a fan of cooked rhubarb, and I haven't eaten raw rhubarb since I was a kid, for some reason... I guess I got out of the habit), and a bunch of it was going mushy anyway.

In the first photo, there's a box. I had assumed it was insulating something. I was curious what it was insulating, so I tipped it over. I discovered that there was nothing inside (despite it having insulation on the inside), plus it completely fell apart (it had been sitting there for around 30 years, I think), so I put it with dad's junk to be hauled away.

Rhubarb leaves are poisonous (oxalic acid). People seem to be split on whether rhubarb leaves can be composted if the compost will be used in a vegetable garden. Since it was looking like I'd fill up my composter anyway, I decided to leave the leaves in a pile here in the rhubarb patch to compost (already decomposing leaves raked on top)... I figure it's safe to use rhubarb leaf compost on the rhubarb patch. ;)

The day lily is still blooming, although it's looking a bit cold:

Front yard, before:

As you can see, the sour cherry hasn't realized it's fall yet, and is still holding on to its leaves. The elms have lost some but not all of their leaves. The little tree on the boulevard is pretty bare now, though.

Random thought: American friends? Do you call the strip of grass between the sidewalk and the road a "boulevard" too? (Given that it comes from French, I'm wondering if maybe you don't...)

Given how fresh leaves like to fall and/or blow in, I took "after" shots whenever I finished a section, just to prove that it looked reasonably good at one point. ;)

First section:

This section filled up the rest of my composter.

Second section:

This section filled up the pink trash can, plus more that I just dumped in a heap in the back. (I'm using the other two trash cans for yard waste that I don't want in my compost.) My friend "Vanna" here stopped by for a visit... I multi-tasked, though, and raked while I visited. (Too much to do before the snow flies!)

Third section (well, includes whole front lawn, really):

This produced another two wheelbarrows full that just got dumped on the heap in the back.

It's a small yard, and it wasn't even that full of leaves... and yet I *still* have a huge pile out back!

Back yard patch of grass, before:

(The plum tree also still needs to lose most of its leaves.)

After:


I just discovered that Flickr decided to default to small photos today. I'm too lazy to go back and fix all the photos I've already copied & pasted code for... so if you want to see a bigger view, click through to Flickr.

My big pile of leaves:

(Yes, the photo is blurry. It was getting dark by then, and I don't like to use the flash, so use longer exposure times instead. I didn't notice that the photo was like that until I uploaded to my computer, by which point it was too dark to retake the photo.)

I also rearranged some stuff on the patio, and swept some spots. Here's a "before" shot (well, mostly before, I moved some stuff before this shot):

(Whoops, small photo again.)

And here's an "after":

I still need to get rid of a lot of dad's junk, but things are improving.

Oh, I drained the hose in this photo too.

Of course, I *meant* to get farther than this... I wanted to at least *start* on bringing down the dead tree, and planting the perennials sitting in pots... *sigh*

Quick Improvement

The "front" back gate now has a hook and eye to hold it open: