I love Kijiji

This past Saturday Nina found someone on Kijiji (free local online classified website) giving away free trees. I had no idea that it would be this big! It was a bit of an ordeal digging it out by hand and planting it the same night, but worth it. I hope it takes the transplant OK; I inadvertantly cut a couple of the roots when digging it up but it seems to be doing OK other than a couple drooping candles on the top. I have been giving it lots to drink every day and the rain has helped as well...not sure how long it will take to let me know whether it is going to make it or not, so for now it is a waiting game. The same lady had another White Pine a little smaller than this one and a Blue Spruce probably about 14 feet tall but I did not have the room or the back to tackle those.
The spruce in this picture is a Baby Blue Spruce...supposed to stay fairly narrow and get about 18' tall.

Emperor 1

New Japanese Maple planted off what will be the corner of the deck...wood gets delivered on Friday. I love the glow that comes thru the leaves in the evening.

Take your pick

Lots of choices for the birds. I am trying to attract Blue Jays and Cardinals with the new tray feeder (closest). So far we get a lot of Red Wing Blackbirds and Finches.

Summer storms

Another storm blowing thru tonight, nice to see the rain, but the japanese maples are not digging the wind.

Safety in numbers

Brush with death...bunny-style

Nina was turning over this raised garden bed that we inherited with the new house in efforts to plant some strawberries and veggies...well it seems that the space is already spoken for as she just about decapitated half a warren of small bunnies (see location of pitch fork in pic)...maybe not the best place for a veggie garde. Now what to do with our new tenants?

The Dark Nut

Citizen of the Year

Ben was given the Citizen of the Year for his Kindergarten class today.

Front garden progress incl. new water feature

Batik Iris

New favourite in the garden.

Good help found

...at least until the water runs out!

Progress

So here is the new front/side garden so far...going with an Asian/Woodland theme. The side along the house will be tall, narrow grasses I think. Nina suggested a water feature between the house and the weeping Jap. Maple and there is one that I like at Loblaw's so I think that will be added this weekend.

Step 2 (aka man's greatest achievement)

Ok, forget the car, space travel or the cell phone...by far, man's best achievement to date has got to be the sod cutter. Wow, what a cool machine. This probably would have taken me the better part of a day/weekend and the better part of a hernia to try and do this by hand...but with the sod cutter it was less than 1/2 hour to cut it, well worth every penny and more of the 60 dollar rental fee...the tough part was just rolling it up and setting it in the driveway; now if someone will just respond to my 'Free Sod' sign I can have my driveway back.

Black Gold

The first step for the front/side yard is 4 yards of 3 way mix soil. This lot is made with black loam, manure and mushroom compost which apparently is naturally weed free (at least to start)...and from the scent wafting into the garage, I am sure that the manure content is pretty high.

Blank Slate

The front garden is my first project at the new place. The whole yard is a blank slate but the front yard is the first impression that people get so it gets done first. We have a deck budgeted for this summer too...

Mom and Dad's new garden plan *UPDATED*

Mom has asked me to help with their front garden at their new place. Attached is my first draft. Mostly purple and white themed - I hope they like it.

UPDATED: After getting some better info about their front yard location and surroundings I think their front is much more suited to partial to full shade plants. Hence the update. I think I might switch the Witch Hazel and Pagoda Dogwood, but we'll see.

The Fever

Despite the never ending winter, I have officially got the itch to plant something. Canadale Nurseries in St. Thomas was my fix of choice this weekend as they had an advertised Spring Garden Show on. The show itself was much ado about nothing - mostly just some local landscape companies with an 8x8 display, but I will chalk it up to their first year with such an event and hope the next one is better. While there though I did pick up on some cool things. I love Scotch Pine topiary. I loved it as soon as I saw it but the price quickly brought me back to my senses - it can be yours for a mere $800.00. I guess when you think of how long somebody has worked at this it is not a horrible price, but out of my humble price range.


I also noticed that there are a lot of succulents out for this year - the new trend I guess. They had some cool ways to display them that I might try; I especially like the concrete birdbath idea.


Hanging basket of succulents


Concrete birdbath with succulents


About 1/10 of the succulent selection out already

All in all in was good to scratch the itch, even if just on the surface...I think I also picked out the plants for our porch container; 1 New Zealand Flax, 1 Leatherleaf Sedge, 1 Ivory Prince Hellebore, 1 Harts Tongue Fern, 1 Autumn Fern and 3 Angelina Sedum.

All dressed up

Liv in her new dress and sweater


Liv and Ben looking like trouble


Everybody say "PICKLE JUICE"!


Isaac all dressed up with his first little tie


The Crew

No escape!

Just as March continues to Lion-ize our area I found out that I needed to go to Alabama for work; so I am thinking (if the plane can get off the ground) that I am going to get a reprieve from the brutal weather, at least for a couple days...
Well the weather forecast for Birmingham is shown below...

Seriously? Snow in Alabama? In March?

Surprise day!

Stratford Garden Festival

Well, it has been a while since my last post but with selling the house and finding a new one (the Tillsonburg dream house didn't work out), it has been a busy February. However, we decided that we needed some downtime this weekend, so we took a trip to the Stratford Garden Festival this weekend. The drive up was pretty white-knuckly due to the drifting snow across the road (in like a Lion!) but we made it.

There were some neat ideas and cool little shops set up, but it was very small. I was expecting a little more I guess. Maybe next year we will do Canada Blooms in Toronto.


Nina and Isaac under cool water arch.

Awesome water feature.


You can't really see it in this picture, but this playset has a little stream moat running around it and under the slide...yeah, that sounds practical!


Love these lights!


This is a cool fireplace. This reminds me of Jamie Oliver's outdoor oven on his show "Jamie at Home".

Big brother and sister

Hey man, nice shot!

The dream

Well it is officially unofficial; our offer for this beautiful home as been accepted by the sellers and now the race is on to sell our home in 6 weeks. I think I have developed painter's elbow (if there isn't such a thing there should be).
While it is unassuming from the exterior, this house is a gem inside, profesionally renovated top to bottom including a great finished attic. It also sits on a huge lot 285 feet deep (think of the gardening!!!) and has access from both front and rear streets. Well, can't waste any more time blogging...back at it...


Front door


Porch


View from rear street access

New project

Well, I picked up a new piece to refinish yesterday. I am intimidated and excited at the same time by this one because I have never done upholstery work before, but for 30$ I couldn't let it go. It is solid walnut. The gentlemen that I bought it from says he has more stuff like this that he will be selling soon...
I am thinking about a forest green velvet for the fabric...I will have to see what is out there.

Winter Wonderland concert

Ben and his JK class put on a Winter Wonderland concert on Friday. Very cute.