I present to you, my garden as it is today.
My backyard:
But this is the stuff that came with the house, and was done by professionals.
Then there are the parts of the yard that are being cultivated by me, the Rookie Gardener. These are my experimental gardens. To give this rookie a little practice as her thumb turns from black, to the current color: greenish-brown.
Here is the garden on the left side of the house:
Not anything special right now. Just a few camellia bushes along the wall of the house and the kitchen window. Oh, and the ugly AC unit at the end of the row. The stepping stones were there when we moved in, but were hidden under wood chips. I uncovered them about a year ago. I have plans to make this into a little rock garden eventually. At the end of the path there is a potted bamboo plant. It adds to the Asian feel that I want to eventually achieve.
Here is the right side of the house:
This side of the house is my baby because I've built it from scratch. When we moved in, this side of the yard had three dead trees, some out of control ground cover, and lots of weeds that blended in. The hubby and I hated it, and my mom told me that it was bad feng shui to have those dead trees and all that overgrowth, so we dug out trees, and pulled out all the groundcover and weeds. And it sat there as a plot of dirt on the side of our house, with dreams of turning it into a garden one day. Unfortunately, I had never been able to keep any kind of plant alive for a long time.
Then one day, I was at the 99c Store, and I saw these kalanchoe plants for sale. I thought, what they heck, they're only a dollar each, so what if I screw up? So I took a shovel and dug some holes in the dirt and planted them. I knew nothing about gardening. I couldn't have picked a better plant to start with for the clay dirt because they flower forever, and they're very drought resistant. Once I saw how much color they added to this plot of dirt, I was hooked. In fact, the flowers in the front row are the kalanchoe that I started with!
That was a year ago. Since then, I've learned that the clay dirt needs to be prepped, and I have mixed looser soil in as I've tried my hand at planting other things with various levels of success. I'm still not as diligent as hardcore gardeners because tilling the entire plot seems like so much work to me, and is very daunting. Instead, every time I plant something, I dig a hole and fill it with gardening soil. I figure this area will slowly become more enriched as I plant more stuff. I'm in no hurry. And now that I have a basic idea of how to plant stuff, I hope this blog will help capture this area as it develops.
Enough of my hopes, dreams, and aspirations! More pictures!!!
Here is more up-close look at the flowerbed as it is today. The bursts of color that are prominent here are my snapdragons, kanachoe, and poppies.
Here are some bulbs that are beginning to sprout out of the ground:
The rocks that I use for borders and to surround these little guys are all from the dirt. I like the idea of using the local natural resources for landscaping.
And here is my little edible section. I've got bell peppers, tomatoes, and strawberries growing here. I grew the peppers and tomatoes from seeds that were taken from vegetables that I used for cooking.
Close-up of the strawberries that are appearing. Don't mind the names on the markers. They were for some seeds that never germinated. Thought I'd use them here to keep the fruits above the ground.
Here is the other section for edibles: chayote (left top), tomato, and bell pepper.
Oh, and I also planted some beans with the chayote at the base of the teepee, and they're starting to sprout!! I hope this teepee will be enough to handle both. I'll probably have to divert the plants so they don't tip in over eventually!!
So as you can probably see, I love my garden, and I'm very excited about all the things that are starting to grow in it!! We'll see how it goes!! Wish me luck, and stick around for the ride!!
