My Love of Landscaping

Moving into a new house with several acres is like staring at a blank canvas, a clean slate if you will, in so many ways. It is ours and our to put our heart into to make it an oasis. Nothing could be more true when it comes to landscaping! Landscaping and gardening is something that I have loved ever since I was a little kid. I have my parents to thank for allowing me, a kid, to indulge myself and be the sole landscaper and gardener of both houses that we lived in when I was growing up. I can't imagine many parents allowing their kids to do this so I guess I must have been doing something right, or they wouldn't have let me do it. After all this wasn't some ugly painting I made at school and hung on the fridge and parents would be proud of it no matter what. This was their yard. The general public saw it and it was a reflection of them. Thanks for that! Landscaping is yet another extension of my artistic eye and innate sense of design. Again, thanks to my parents and my brother Todd for that.

The snow has melted, the ground is no longer frozen and I couldn't be happier to get my hands in the dirt! I have had a first project in mind ever since we moved in. My mind's eye had it all mapped out. Finally I was able to work on it. Each day after work last week I worked on it until it was dark.

Facing the house at the end of the driveway, on the left, I designed and constructed a raised bed framed by a natural rock wall and another cascade of rocks that pour down into the drainage ditch. The bed will be home to various ornamental grasses, perennial flowers and of course, hosta! I absolutely love ornamental grasses and have lots of plans for them. If anyone has any that they need to find a new home for (splitting up bigger plants, etc) let me know, I'll take them! The bed is about 75% complete in construction and the planting has only begun. This bed is also going to be home to our Czar of the Woods Farm sign at some point this summer.

Enjoy!

This is the area last fall, obviously before I did anything to it (and before we moved in)...

and after...

the stone driveway is also new...thanks to my cousin Tim for helping deliver and lay it out last fall right before we moved in...I have been grooming it to make it nice and flat.