Diary of a Green Thumb Wannabe

[Nela]

Soooo... I went from having a one bedroom appartment with no access to a yard to a 3-floor house with a front

garden and backyard Woot Woot! Of course, the cats and I just love the extra space. The house is in excellent

condition but there is definitely one thing that the sellers didn't like: yardwork.

The first thing you would have noticed if you came up to the house was a horrid forest green colored wooden fence

that couldn't quite decide if it was going to stay up or stay down... It HAD to go. The other thing that had to go

was the rocks they put in the flower bed. Nah uh, I no like. Of course, it only looked like there was just a bit of

rock to remove. 16 buckets later, I'm looking for where to dump the rest... Anyway, allllllllll the stones had

weeds between them so we have to clean out all that and then put sand again. It's a long task but it looks so much

better when done.

I've never tended to flowers or anything else much myself. I did have a cactus once... But then it died. Jeff and

yardwork? Bwahahahaha. Non-existant. Lol. I do love flowers though so I am going to make an attempt at having a

flowerbed. I also have decided to use the existent bed in the backyard to grow a tiny garden. That's the intent

anyway...

So for the front, I have decided to go with mainly roses and dahlias. They are my favorite flowers. I don't want

climbing roses though as those will become massive and then I will have to wear body armour to trim them I think.

Instead, I got rose plants or bushes and testing those out. I don't know really what I am doing, but I got the

ones-that-smell-so-sweet-you-can't-stop-smelling-them kind of rose. We got some that are red and yellow and some

that are a pretty pink. We also got smaller ones that are a lovely pink and yellow. The dalias are gorgeous peach,

yellow, and red.

For the back, we got blue hydrangeas because I have always loved hydrangeas. We also got some marguerites (?) and I

am going to go get sunflowers as well. I will attempt to move the huge lavendar plant to the back as well. In the garden, I planted cherry tomatoes, raspberries, and 'gold' raspberries. I've never seen gold ones before so I am really curious as to how those will turn out. I'm thinking of maybe adding bell peppers or something... Not really sure what yet.

Here are some pictures you might enjoy...

Dahlias:

Roses:

Bug on rose:

Herbs (basil, parsley, chives, thyme, lemon thyme, oregano) :

Our first tomatoes:

Others:

Hopefully, I won't kill them all

 

[myLoki]

Beautiful flowers!! I LOVE IT! I've always wanted a garden but I live in the land of extreme heat. Everything just... dies and then I get really sad and NEVER want to plant anything again. I usually try about once a year. hehe.

t.

 

[cheryl]

Such pretty flowers!....i would love to have a nice garden again..i had planted some pretty flowers in the garden out front last yearbut we had a heatwave in the summertime and it killed all my flowers...i was so dissappointed and just didn't worry about it again...as soon as winter is finished here though and spring arrives well i'm gonna start over again and i'm going to plant some pretty shrubs that are more heat resistant...i have big plans for my garden this year....don't know what i'm gonna do about the backyard yet cause i have to be careful when i let the bunnies outside to play...they more or less destroyedmy last garden that i had planted out there..so i dunno about that yet..

But i do love having a pretty garden in my front yard though.

 

[Nela]

Thanks MyLoki, I am glad you enjoyed. Lol @ trying every year It's too bad it's so hard to grow things though. Surely, some things must like growing in that climate?

Cheryl, that's too bad about that heatwave. It must be discouraging and sad when it happens. I know I'd be a little pooped now if I killed all my flowers. At least it's not as bad when it's out of your control. So big plans huh? Do you know what you would like to put? Lol @ the bunnies. I guess that is something to think about!

I'm glad you guys liked the pictures :biggrin:Yesterday, we went to get a few groceries and I spotted some plants on special. I ended up getting the sunflower I wanted (1.75!) and another rose bush I guess it's now clear that I have a thing for roses... Lol. I'll have to get pictures of those

 

[Nela]

So the days are passing and I have yet to advance much in the garden :expressionlessIt's either too hot or raining. Bleh! We really need to paint the bedroom this week since the bedroom set is coming in so time will be spent on that as well.

Tonight, I planted the sunflower we had gotten. It's not huge but it looks pretty. We also bought some peppers and I planted those as well. The cherry tomatoes are almost all red already. I've been considering adding blueberries or strawberries to the fruit side but I'm just not too sure. Meh, we'll have to see if we find anything.

I am really considering pulling out some stone to give me a bit more planting space and then adding a tree in the corner. The yard is lovely but it is terribly bare. We're wondering if we can add a small apple tree or not. I'm rather concerned about the roots and if it could cause problems to the neighbor. Another option is a rose tree. We'll be looking into that and hopefully we'll have something cute in that corner.

I took some more pictures today and Jeff helped as well. Ever since I took the picture of the bug on the rose, I have wanted to get pictures of a snail. Well, since it's been raining today, the snails were out so it was a perfect time.

No snails were harmed in this photoshoot Snailsare perfect models: they are slow so they don't move much Here are some photos for you to enjoy:

Our small plant of cherry tomatoes really gives us quite a bit:

A new rose opened and smells soooo good (It's really funny though, Jeff can smell those that smell more flowery but he cannot smell these sweet-smelling ones at all ):

Snail pictures:

more coming as they upload...:biggrin:

 

[Nela]

More pictures:

annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd a spider which lives in the corner of our shed:

 

[Mintie]

I think you've made dahilias my new favorite flower! Even though it's your first garden, you really seem like you know what you're doing to me and all your veges look tastyyy!

Seeing all those snail pictures is so nostalgic and they're so cute! I barely see any snails in the city.

 

[Nela]

Hi Mintie, I am glad you enjoyed the pictures.Thank you for commenting!

I've just always loved dahlias. I even named a very girlybunny 'Dahlia' in the past. I love the shape and colors they have. It's a rather easy flower to maintain I believe so it's a good addition. I really have no idea what I am doing actually LOL. I do think I am picking flowers that aren't too hard to maintain. At least I hope... I know I will have to trim the roses, which is why I chose not to add any climbing ones since those can get quite massive andare a pain to trim. :expressionlessOn the other hand, I believe what I have planted in the garden will take well. The herbs are doing nicely and so are the other plants. I really love growing things I can use in the kitchen, it's just so rewarding when you make a salad using homegrown ingredients :biggrin2:

I'm glad you enjoyed the snails. That's too bad that you don't see many in the city. I am originally from Montreal so wedidn't havemuch either. The good thing was I wasn't too far from the river so I did get to see big ones sometimes :biggrin:I'm seriously considering keeping a pair as pets. I have always loved snails and I think I could learn a lot from them. I have read up on them and they say this is agood species to keep as pets. I'll consider it

 

[GoinBackToCali]

OMG.. your pics are GORGEOUS..

I really enjoyed them.. I love the insect ones. LOVE THEM..

Please keep posting them. I like bugs..lol

My birth mom would enjoy your flower shots as matted framed pics..may I?

Here's a link to my crappy veggie garden in the butt crack of Texas. I wish mine was like yours..

JEALOUS!!!!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2041935&id=1122332608&l=67520d0d5d

 

[myLoki]

The snails make me go "AWWWWW!" and "EWWWWW!" at the same time. Not sure how that works. hehe!

t.

 

[Myia09]

What a great garden! The flowers are beautiful!

I live in Arizona..but right now I am apartment gardening mostly sulcultas, but a good choice for high heat gardening is decorative grass! It does great in high heat.

And I love the snail!

 

[Nela]

Zin,

Feel free to use them, it makes me very happy that someone could enjoy them :biggrin2:We bought a nice big digital frame to display ours in. Lol, it's nice to know someone could enjoy the bug pictures.I wasn't sure what the reaction towards them would be Gonna check your link in a sec :biggrin2:

MyLoki,

Lol. Well, I am glad you enjoyed them... sorta Hehe, I get what you mean though. I thought the snails were great models to play around with.

Myia,

What is decorative grass? :?I'm curious. Hihihi. Of course I could just google it... I would fail miserably at appartment gardening... I am not sure why exactly, but I find it harder.

Thanks for your comments guys!

 

[Nela]

Zin,

Lol the bees seem to like your garden :biggrin:You seem to have a really good space though, am I wrong? You have a lot of grass. Here, I have no grass at all. It's all pavement, that's why I have to work so hard at having a good garden or else it looks like a school yard. The ones with yellow flowers, they are cucumbers?

You know, I've been racking my head and trying to think of what I could put that would along the fence and now, looking at your pictures, it hit me - green beans! Well, of course, maybe those could work! :biggrin2:

Hey if ever you want a bunch of snails, just plant lettuce

 

[Myia09]

Decorative grass is just grass; but it can be pretty.

Here are some examples:

Oat Grass (Can also be fed to bunnies!)
http://www.awanursery.co.nz/images/BlueOat.jpg

Some general pics:
http://www.gardenersworld.com/plants/features/grasses/main.jpg

New Zealand Flax:
http://pics.davesgarden.com/pics/2003/12/20/palmbob/b3562b.jpg

 

[Nela]

Sooooo it's been nice and hot here but there were some good gardening moments. It's been a bit hard to juggle painting the bedroom and gardening but I made a little bit of progress. I thought I would just share a few pictures with you and cut back on the 'blah blah blah' since I'm not sure people enjoy it too much. Lol. Here you are:

The roses are doing really well...

This is a rose tree we found on special:

Look how well the cherry tomatoes are doing...

More veggies!

more coming...

 

[Nela]

We needed more edibles

Cucumbers:

part of the gardenin brief:

We also got french geraniums. I found them beautiful!

We decided to go with a weeping rose tree for the corner for now. It's gorgeous

And lastly here are a few pictures of the lavendar in the front, with some insect ones for Zin, though they aren't too good. Lol

 

[JadeIcing]

I want to live in your garden.

 

[Nancy McClelland]

the pictures of the flowers and garden are great, snails not so much. We really miss our yard and garden we had before we moved--14 fruit trees, strawberries, 8 types of tomato, 5 types of peppers, peas, snow peas, green beans, etc. With your roses don't over trim them which is something people tend to do. Also, remove the spent blossoms by pinching them off with your thumb and finger and it will force more blooms. One thing that help with a yard renovation is to graph out your yard, front and back to scale, and then you can draw up plans on how you want it to be eventually by doing smaller grids one at a time. We had our back yard all laid out with raised planters with black plastic stretch out over the soil and our plants thru slits. Kept the weeds and pest to a minimum, aided growth as it warmed the soil, and helped with watering as we did not need as much. By using wood frames, we were able to change the paths from season to season as it made it easier to move soil and configuration with the stepping stones. Sure do miss it but the winters here are much milder. Thanks for the pictures.