Progress & Improvements

Finally spring seems to have come to the mountain top and for a change the weather was cooperative when I had time off work!

Needless to say I took advantage of every second of sunshine and spent the entire weekend outside - and boy did it feel good!

 

There are still many more things to be done to get my property cleaned up for spring, but I made a good dent in the to-do list this weekend. 

Of course, as a blogger you know I have to take photos to share with all of my wonderful readers! 

The first project I tackled bright and early Saturday morning was my perennial bed and garden steps. Every spring this bed is a complete nightmare to clean up and as such a huge project I knew I had to tackle it first before I wore myself out. 

I swore last summer I was going to rip out those three rosebushes in the center of the garden but somehow they are still there. Maybe I'll give them one more season to redeem themselves. I'm not even sure the center one is still alive, I guess time will tell!

The Iris patch is coming up nice and strong, but I know I'll be fighting with the dreaded tansy to give it some breathing room, just like last year. 

Lord I really hate that Tansy! 

It's always amazing when I rake out the leaves how much new growth is under there, despite the fact that we still (yes STILL) have pockets of snow sticking around. 

I actually had to shovel some off the garden steps in order to finish the job!

The ground covers have been cut back, the solar lights straightened up, the steps cleaned, and the shrub at the bottom tied back....what an improvement over the photo I showed you in this recent post!

I must say it's really nice to have use of the steps again...they have been buried under snow for ages and I missed them!

The veggie garden was cleaned up, the soil amended and turned over, and the soaker hose put back in place. Ready for planting! 

If you want to see how I get the veggie garden ready for planting each spring you can check out this post that has specific instructions as well as some of my favorite garden tools. 

The garden bed next to my garden cottage got a good clean out as well, as did the pots around the garden cottage. Then it was time for a little planting and I can't tell you how wonderful it felt to be able to plant flowers once again! I'll add some summer annuals to the pots in late May but for now the pansies and violas that are scattered about soothe my gardener's soul and make me ever so happy!

The lattice on the bottom of the garden cottage did not get done yet....soon. Patience is not my virtue, but there are only so many hours in the day.  Sweetie is going to tackle it for me when he has time....but he's busy with his own spring clean up right now, and he has more property than me!

As if that wasn't enough to get done in a weekend, I decided to push my sore little body a little more and tackle something else that was on my to-do list. 

Remember when Sweetie installed this beautiful fence for me a couple of years ago? I really love looking down from my deck and seeing this split rail fence - I always wanted one, they are just so perfect up here in the mountains. 

In front of the fence on one side are Lilacs, Hydranges, and a rambling Rose. On the other side is Ninebark and Tangelo Barberry. They are all doing so well and I should even see flowers on the Lilac this season, I hope! They suffered a few broken branches with Winter Storm Riley but nothing too terrible....not like Sweetie's beautiful crabapple trees that were completely destroyed! 

Anyway, last summer after Sweetie installed the path to the veggie garden and I replaced the border around the surrounding garden bed with the left-over pavers, he ordered a pallet of pavers to be delivered to my house as a surprise. 

They sat there all winter, while I pondered exactly what projects I would tackle with them come spring. 

Well, tackle I did!

Look at how nicely the pavers finish off the garden by the fence line! I feel all fancy now!! I can hardly wait for things to fill in and green out to really see how nice it looks!

Here come the two inspectors checking to see if I did a good job!

Things went a little crooked at the far end, I think I was passing out with exhaustion about that time. I will have to fix that end before the pavers settle. 

But it really looks so good, and it's such a nice barrier from the 'wild' garden on the other side of the fence and the steep ravine. 

Love, love, love!! 

I freshened the mulch when I had the pavers in place and that garden as well as the Bloodgood Japanese Maple in the center of the front garden are all ready for spring!

You can see what the front garden looked like before all these improvements in this post. 

It's a good thing I keep a blog so I can look back and see what we've done and how things used to look! It helps to put things in perspective when I'm stressing about all the spring chores that still need to be tackled. 

I sure did get a workout this weekend - I think I broke my Fitbit record!

But do you know what my favorite project is that was completed this weekend?

This one!  Sweetie installed my clothesline and it was used for two loads of wash already!!

I just love seeing my clean clothes hanging out drying in the sunshine and country breezes - it truly is the little things in life, you know?

How did you spend this lovely spring weekend? Were you out playing in the dirt like me? 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sharing at: