mulch

DIY backyard flower and plant garden

/ Roadtirementvintage / 4 Comments

This year was the time for our “Do It Ourself” flower and plant garden. Our starting point was deciding what existing plants would be kept and what new types would be planted how and where.

This was the first area improved.

The first improvement was a black border installed around a new area with washed river rock placed. An existing rose bush, a couple of Hostas and some Asiatic lilies remained to receive their new stone bed. Some annuals in pots fit in well after the stone was put in place.

Greenery in lower right are perennials living on and around what is left of a large stump.

Next came the clean up of the weeds and unwanted plants to be replaced with a layer of relatively course topsoil. Then landscaping rocks and flowers planted in pots. Existing chives and some sage was left as is. A large bird bath was placed and immediately became a favorite water park for a plethora of birds.

It has been worth waiting four years for this beautiful peony to bloom

Potted flowers on antique glass bricks

Herbs and bird fountain on low shelf

Twin solar powered water fountains are enjoyed by many birds daily!

We are really enjoying the growth of many of our plantings. A border ring around a large Maple tree trunk is doing pretty well with the growth of wild flowers after their first year of growth. The rose bush mentioned has put on several beautiful roses. The bulbs produced enough lilies for several vases worth of fresh flowers for inside our home. Do it yourself gardening is a wonderful way to enjoy your piece of the great outdoors.

A couple more photos from out front

/ Roadtirementvintage / 5 Comments

In the front of Roadtirement’s  “home base” in central Indiana we have a mulched strip on either side of the front door. Here’s a couple of images:

This is a new rose bush that we planted about a week ago. The first rose bud is showing some color. There are two more buds developing to the right of the big one.

There are lots of little mushrooms showing up in the mulch beds. The remnants of maple tree whirligig flying seeds are also in view, along with some unidentified green sprouts of some kind.

 

Finished with the mulch project

/ Roadtirementvintage / 14 Comments

If you’ve been following along with some of the projects Roadtirement has been working on during our COVID-19 stay safe at home time, you will know that mulching has been a big part of our flower garden design. (Whew, what a long sentence!)

Herbs and wildflower starts on an old stump

Still needing a bit of grass/weeding work, but close to done

Our son has been such a great help in toting bags of mulch and spreading same. The herbs are doing very nicely, and seem happy to be on the remains of an old trees stump. Sher spread some wild flower seeds on the rich soil on the sides of the stump, and several seeds have already sprouted.

Working on the flower garden

/ Roadtirementvintage / 16 Comments

Sher is planting petunias in some additional containers. She just got done planting some herbs. Our son, in the back left, is getting ready to hook the hose to the pressure washer. You can see a kitchen sink. Yes, that will be pressure washed and turned into some kind of planter in one side and a bird bath in the other.

We’ve been raking the tilled ground in preparation for placing some mulch. We have some pretty colored rocks that we picked up out in the country a few days ago. These are all glacial deposits that came down from Canada during the Ice Age.

This COVID-19 thing has us  stuck at home, like so many of our friends and family. Putting together our flower garden is a welcome project for many reasons. It gets us out side, gives a goal to shoot for, and when it comes to the vegetable garden, hopefully we’ll be able to consume the fruits of our labor.

Indiana is starting to slowly “open back up”. Some more stores are now open at reduced capacity. Restaurants can open for inside business at 50% capacity with restrictions. It is easy to desire to get back to normal after the long stay at home. But remember, the virus is still out there!

Don’t let your guard down, be safe and stay healthy.

Got the fence put up

/ Roadtirementvintage / 25 Comments

Yesterday Roadtirement posted about our backyard projects. Our son got the mulch placed around the tree. I got most of the fence sections scraped and painted to go around the mulch bed.

This morning I set out the fence sections that were done. Turns out I just needed four more sections to complete the circle around the tree. It did not take too long to prepare and paint four more sections, let them dry, and install. You can see the result, above. The green stuff on the mulch is the seeds and such falling off the tree.

Hang in there, don’t be too bored, and keep using those safe practices

Some backyard projects while Roadtirement is shutdown

/ Roadtirementvintage / 12 Comments

We had another day of nice weather today. The sun was out, temps did hit the high 60s and there was a moderate breeze. A good scenario for some backyard projects.

Work in progress

Ready for a border and flowers

 

 

 

 

 

One project was the placement of mulch at the base of one of the trees in our backyard. The plastic bags that package the mulch makes for a decent barrier to keep unwanted weed growth.

The old flaky paint must go

Spray painting the scraped sections

 

 

 

 

 

While our son was putting down the mulch, I was scraping old paint off some flower bed border fence sections. I spray painted them as well. Got about half of the ones I need done to circle the new mulch bed around the tree.

Next will be the decision on the plantings in the mulch. It felt good getting some outside work done today. And I didn’t watch any COVID-19 briefings from our governor or from Trump. That was nice….

Stay safe, get some exercise, social distance yourself and wash those hands.