I tried to make a nice little panorama of the garden, but as you can see, my Photoshop skills leave a little to be desired. Oh well - at least you can kind of see what we've got! You'll have to click on the pictures to actually be able to see anything....panoramas are huge!
When Brendan bought the house, one of the things he loved was the location - not just the town, although we love that too, but the fact that the house is located at the edge of a cliff with a beautiful view, and that it's at the top of a hill in his neighborhood. The outdoor areas of the house were a huge selling feature, and this garden certainly helped convince him to buy. The only problem is, there is a LOT to learn about keeping this garden up!
This is my first year paying attention to what we have outside, and so far I see hostas, some ornamental grasses, some unidentified pink and blue flowers, a not-yet-growing rose bush, and something that looks like creeping juniper. I am learning as we go, so I'm sure I'll know a lot more about the garden as time goes on! One of the things we're doing this year is keeping track of how it looks every month, so that we know when each flower comes out.
I have to say, one of the weirdest things I've noticed is that trees seem to try to grow EVERYWHERE around the house. I didn't know trees could just sprout up randomly - I thought beyond just the acorn, they needed a little food and water and general care - but apparently, they can just pop up anywhere they please! I have picked more trees than actual weeds out of the garden so far, which is a little odd. We have to keep viligant, or we'll have a forest in the backyard instead of landscaping.
Aside from the beautiful plants, I now have an herb garden and some tomatoes:
The herb garden is sweet basil, Greek oregano, cilantro, rosemary, summer squash, and orange bell peppers. In the small clay pot is green peppers - I think I may be planting those in the soil soon, I just wanted to make sure that things could grow in there before I put everything into the ground! We have used some of the cilantro, basil, and oregano, and they were delicious.
And in the deck pots we have "Black Prince" heirloom tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, strawberries, and "Red Beefsteak" and "Mr. Stripey" heirloom tomatoes.
I am really excited about having actual food come out of our garden. Last year's CSA experiment was great, but actually growing the food myself would be even more rewarding, and we'd have an abundance of the things we love without the abundance of random greens that we won't eat. Let's cross our fingers that some of these actually grow - I'll keep you all posted!
That's it for now, but I'll have more soon on how the house is coming along once I get pictures of all the newly-clean rooms!
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