Making a bed for my Flowers!

When we moved in our first home, I was as inexperienced as can be in all things that had to do with taking care of a home. Living in an apartment is very different that living in a home. Here we had the freedom to do anything, but we also had to DO everything. There was no call to the landlord about leaky faucets, or unkept lawns. Here if we wanted it to be maintained, we either did it ourselves, or payed someone to do it. Being the I can do it myself kind of gal, and having a mother who was more than willing to help, I was lucky enough to get my garden in pretty good shape, without hiring anyone.

I was about 6 months pregnant when we got our home, and the middle of hot humid Ga summer. Not either of those things kept me from making this house look like a home, even if it was just the beginning. Almost 7 years later and I'm still very much working on it, but here's some pics I found of one of my first garden projects. I hate to think I never took pics of the garden when we first moved in, but that was before I had a digital camera, and there is no way I got around to looking through all those old photos.

**I've linked this up to NOT JUST A HOUSEWIFE on 7/23/2011**

One of the beauties that will come from this garden. Much later of course, for now lets start at the beginning. 

When I was going through my pics, I kept thinking how could I not have a before pic, and I still  haven't found one, but this is as close to it as you're going to get right now. This pic was taken just after a year of moving in. The summer before  I had worked on getting all the shrubs out, and removing grass, so I could extend the design of my flower bed. I also got a start on planting some perineals, and I had that grey border in for about the whole year. I was simply not happy with  the low flower bed, and wanted something that would stand out. Plus every time it rained my entire flower bed would get destroyed, ,and I really hated that. This was my second first day of school pic, which of course turned into a tradition. This was Big B's 1st day of 1st grade August 2005.

So a whole year passes from the picture taken above, and it is now July 2006.My mom shared some plants from here garden. Most of the day lilles, and the hydrangea bush in the left corner, came from her garden. Along with some of the hydrangeas on the left side of the house. The trees, and roses came from Home Depot. This pic shows my garden bed already made for the most part. I brought it down further down the sidewalk, and created the shape. Before it was just a rectangle in front of the window, and nothing but shrubs. Notice my lovely Green shutters, and front door. I don't know what the previous homeowners had with the green, but it was everywhere.

This also shows a tree I had planted in the front, by my mailbox. Nothing fancy, literally just dug a hole, and thats it. As I got wiser though I realized thats not the best way to plant a tree, especially when it's on a downhill slope and water doesn't get to it very well. While this particular tree didn't stay, I did end up planting something else there. You can also see my two different bricks, as I wasn't sure what I would like. I had the grey for about 2 year now, and was playing around with maybe going with red. 

I also made a flower bed on both sides of the house. This was not there before, and it made a huge difference.  This also took forever as I had to remove grass, and I put down weed barrier stuff. 

The other side of the house. My lawn was so torn up when we moved in. It's taken years to kind of get it in order. I guess it also didn't help that I was trying to cut it with a cheap mower I got from a yard sale. I hated mowing the lawn, especially this hill. It was thw worst. I also wanted to cover up that ugly air conditioner, and utiltity boxes. My plants are so small in this pic. The mums are no longer a part of my garden, but everything else is still there, in different spots.

My front walkway looks pretty horrible. Aparranttly I was having a really hard time figuring out what I wanted to do with the border. Hmm, grey or red, grey or red? It was a mess, and I wanted it over with. I still have my little turtle and pig!!

Before I simply went crazy, I decided that I couldn't proceed until I saw what this might look like. I tried drawing the planter, but it just didn't give me the right idea. I think I used paint or something to sketch out a design. It's pretty funny, but it did give me the visual I needed. 

Another idea I had. Notice how I really wanted my shutters black. Much later I finally got around to doing that. Also I had a lot of pretty flowers in mind. Looks pretty good doesn't it?

Oh yeah look at that lawn. I wish,,, lol. I think I didn't finish putting all my lovely flowers in this one, but you get the idea.

Don't be confused, but all the pics so far are taken July 2006. After playing around with the red border, and having had the grey I knew it just wasn't what I wanted. So after much hard work, and bribing my brother to help, we were able to get this pretty nifty wall up. Just enough to make it a raised flower bed. Now I really was starting to like it. Just like in my sketches I did get some trellisis and some beautiful yellow climbing roses, but I quickly realized that those roses just weren't my thing. Too much hard work. The knockout roses I planted the year before on the other hand are awesome. No maintenance required. I wanted a very low maintenance garden, and that's what I got.

Just another view of my newly raised flower bed. It took the entire day to do this, but considering we had no idea what we were doing, I do think it turned out pretty good. The laundry basket is filled with plants that need to be transplanted again, as I had to take most of them out and replant after adding about 6 inches of soil. Also I got lucky at Lowes and found some great perinials on clearance, for like $1.00 or so, and grabbed them all up. Those things are awesome and come back year after year. Most of my garden is planted with perinials, and the few annuals just for some extra color.

So fast forward another year, and we are in the summer of 2007, lol. My sketches came in handy, as I got pretty darn close to what I had in mind. I even have the trellis/circle design (how cool I was able to find one thing to intigrate both my ideas. Also got a bird bath, but unfortunately didn't use it for that. Instead it's just a plant holder. The fall before I got a bunch of bulbs that were marked on clearance of course. So I picked up a bunch, and this was their first appearance. Woo hoo, My roses have like doubled in size, and you can see that there's not much color except for the bulbs. Spring had just started and my garden would have just started blooming again. Grass is dormant, but it's a BEAUTIFUL spring day and my kids have taken advantage of the weather, and decided to play in the sprinklers. 

My weeping crabapple tree is blooming, and this is actually what is still there now. 

Looks like it's time to re mulch. If it weren't for the blooming bulbs, there would not be much going on right now. 

I put cracked flagstone throughout the garden simply because I liked the way it looked, and it really helped when I walked in there, as I didn't get all muddy. 

Oh you can barely see the tree by the mailbox, but its no longer just a hole in the ground. I made a pretty round planter for that too. That rosemary was planted the previous year, and it was like 4 inches tall, let me tell you, if you want an herb, that is easy to grow, and doesn't die, then plant this. That thing grew so big, that I ended up taking it out the following year I think. Do you see those lovely flowering bulbs? They smell sooooo good, every time you walked past them you could smell them It was wonderful.

After five months of summer, this is what my garden looked like. See how nicely everything grew in, and DO YOU SEE that rosemary? Im telling you it would have grown in a tree, if I let it. So this vine you see invading my rose, was really bothering me. It grew like crazy, literally cut it down, and 2 days later again, it was climbing up the rose bush. Then I didn't get around to removing it for a few days, and noticed it had the loveliest flowers that bloomed in the mornings. Thus the name MORNING GLORY. I have no idea where it came from, but it took refuge in my garden and no matter what it came back every year after this. I was struggling with removing it, so decided to take some pics to remember it. 

Isn't that beautiful?

Perfect rose. 

Morning Glory!

This was another school morning pic. Not sure what the reason was, as it was mid November, but non the less, another look at that garden. Check out how much it grew in one season! Oh and I finally painted my shutters and front door black. Doesn't it look so much better, especially with the black mulch, and white brick. I really love it. 

Just thought you'd like to see one more pic. Its December now, and hello, can you see the size of that rose bush. Remember when I planted them and they were only like 2 feet tall, not even as tall as that flag. Now look at it. I trimmed those bad boys down this spring. I was scarred to death, that I was going to do it wrong, and they would die. Nothing of the sort happened, and they grew ever so beautifully. I looked everywhere to find some recent pics of my garden this summer. As of right now, can't find any. Truth be told I neglected my garden really bad, so it's no wonder. As soon as I get around to fixing it up a bit, I will post some more pics. Oh those trees that I had by the garage, died on me. Can't figure it out, I guess they were too high maintenance for me. So temporarilly replaced with planters, and annuals. Works for now, but I really want more there. We'll have to see what I come up with. 

BEFORE

AFTER

Thanks for checking out my garden, and don't forget there's still time to enter my NEW linky party.
Amaze me August where you can share any and all projects, recipes, diy projects you have been working on. Me I'm focusing on getting my home organized so I can start working on some projects.


As always ENJOY!

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