Maintenance

North by northeast. A little raking, a little sweeping, a little weed- and root-pulling. 

South by southwest

Now, Climb!

North by northeast. As you can see, I put up the trellises today, and the hose is snaking over to water the lavender.

South by southwest. 

This trellis is for the bower vine. It hasn't covered that much of the trellis on its own, of course. I put it there. 

And this one is for the Boston ivy. Climb, little runners! 

This is the lavender. At the nursery they were being swarmed over by butterflies. Here, not so much. I put it where I dug out some stobs the other day. 

In Memoriam

North by northeast. Today is the second anniversary of the death of my wife, Susan. I thought about scattering her ashes in the garden, but it turns out that's illegal. And probably, given that this is a condo and I don't really own the ground it's on, not really a good idea to break the law. So after I did some raking I went to the nursery and bought a lavender plant. She loved the smell. I'll set  it out tomorrow. 

South by southeast. I also got a couple of trellises at the nursery (much cheaper than OSH), and I'll put those up tomorrow too. 

Slow Day

South by southwest. Did a little watering, hence the hose trails in the dirt. 

North by northeast. 

Twine (n.), Twine (v.)

Stephanotis. So, after looking at trellises yesterday I went and bought some twine, in hopes that I can train my little climbers to ... climb. I bought Miss 'Otis originally because she was so twined around others of her kind in the nursery that I thought for sure she was an ambitious little plant. Come to find out she's probably not long for this climate, but this whole garden thing is an experiment for me anyway. 

The bower vine is all sorts of tendrils, wrapping around themselves in little corkscrews. So maybe they'll wrap around the twine and head for the latticework at the top of the fence. 

South by southwest. Look at how clean the concrete slab is! I bought a broom specially for it.

North by northeast. I think the little dicots popping up everywhere are whatever has those geranium-shaped leaves. I wish I could find out what it is. I've been sort of haphazardly thinning them out. 

Stobbornness

North by northeast. The shrub in the lower left corner is the winter daphne, which I guess means that it blooms in the winter. It was here when I moved in ten years ago, and was just a little thing -- in fact, the reason I know it's a winter daphne is that the label from the nursery was still attached to it. It has thrived on my neglect, and as the two pictures just below show, it's beginning to bud out. 

South by southwest. Mostly what I did today was dig out and cut back some more stobs, which had begun to show new growth. (Is it a good thing that they seem to be so insistent on growing? Does that mean the garden is fertile?) And then I went out to buy some trellises, but didn't like anything I saw (or the prices) at OSH. Maybe the nursery has something better. Instead I bought some twine. I think I'll try to rig up something for things to climb.  

October Surprise

There is a vestige of a garden path that begins at the gate ...

... but then peters out, as far as I can tell by digging and scraping. It would be nice to have something to walk on in rainy weather, but this one sunk under its own weight long ago, and will get covered up again by mud when the rains come. 

Dicots are swarming around the plants (this is the climbing hydrangea) that I'm watering. I don't know what they are. Should I give them time to declare themselves friend or foe?

South by southwest 

North by northeast