Well, I never!

This is what I awoke to yesterday. Sigh. And let me tell you, yes they did leave huge scars in the front lawn and no they did not get the dirt/gravel out of our drainage ditch. Oh well, at least I got some free leveling dirt and gravel out of the ordeal for our...

...tree ring!

Thankfully the street guys took their lunch right before the delivery guy showed up with our stones. Poor fella had to walk then drive his forklift the whole length of our street just to get to the house. I started work on the tree ring yesterday and I'm so excited with how it looks so far! And I'm in too much pain to finish it today. My left arm is about dead from lifting these bad boys and the bags of sand needed to make them level. I got two levels up yesterday and a bag of pea pebbles down for drainage. Still need more pebbles (a lot more) and dirt and plants. But I've hit a bit of a financial wall. After I bought these, I realize I had to get a hotel room for my cousin's wedding this weekend, bought presents, and then Foster had to go to doggy emergency room. He's fine now, well, except his pride.



"What are you wearing?!"

He's got another corneal ulcer, but thankfully this one is very tiny compared to last time. Last year he had the same thing and we didn't get an e-collar on him in time and he almost ruptured his eye. He had to have a cornea graft and now he's partially blind in that eye. Which is kind of humorous, because I'm also blind in the same eye so when we go on walks or pass by each other in the hallway we both move the same direction because we favor our good side. Looks like he'll have to take some medicine for a week then go back to the vet for a check-up. But after all that, plus a skimpy month in pay for me, these next two weeks are going to be tough. Probably won't be getting any hostas in that ring anytime soon. Unless Dad's got some plants for me when I visit... 

Hello, Sun!

Today was b-e-a-utiful! And you can bet your sweet bippy I took advantage of it. Let's see...

I pruned a few shrubs, including two very neglected forsythias.


Before



After

I know it doesn't look that great, but you'll just have to trust me on this. It had to be done! These two shrubs were beginning to get big enough they were touching the house, growing even more shrubs, and half of them were dead. I was really afraid to prune these guys since I've never really pruned anything except for a couple of box shrubs at my parent's old house. I had to take out any branches that were 3/4" or thicker, anything touching the ground, anything dead, and anything that was really criss-crossed. (And, boy, do these suckers get tangled!)

I also fertilized the front yard, but Ben tells me that the "grass" that I like in the yard isn't grass at all. He said the nice looking stuff is actually the weeds and that really scratchy stuff is the real grass. Herumph! If that's really what crabgrass is, how strange is it that I would prefer a yard full of it? I hope he's not right and it's just two types of grass in our yard.

And the thing I'm most excited about, I got some edging stones for the flower bed! Now that I'm thinking about it, there's no flowers in it, so should it be a shrub bed? Anyhoo, the edging really makes a difference, see?

Before. This is only half of it, forgot to take a picture of all of it before...oops.



After!

Ahhh, such definition! I wasn't such if I should get these or the red, since we'll probably paint the house one day. I'm hoping that either they'll go with whatever colors we choose, or if they don't we can stain them if we have to. But for now I'm loving them! Now the flower bed just needs some work and maybe even some flowers.