Mr Grinch's Garden

mmmmm
Trying to reply to individual posts, pressing the qoute button then posting but they are not appearing on the thread.


help

 

Sorry, automatic spam filter, it thought the quotes might be links.

Should stop happening after you've posted 10 posts.

 

Just a quick intro into my garden.
We moved into our place in Oct 2005 but it was unenhabitable until the following Feb.
The garden when we moved in.


The house needed fixing. The previous owners hadnt done anything to it. Water ran down the walls when it rained, doors wouldnt close, the smell of damp and mould was everywhere. So, 4 months of slog and we finally moved in. BUT i was itching to get into the garden. As our exstension was being built, i started on the garden. The West facing border was cut first, small plants were bought and by the middle of summer it looked like this.



The day lillies were gorgeous:


The East facing border had not been dug yet. There were piles of rubble and sheds that were in the way. It just had to wait. Our first baby arrived, so we just relaxed in the gorgeous dry and hot summer of 2006.



The lack of rain was nice in that summer but it masked a problem, that i will show you later.

To be continued...................... :D

 

Welcome from me too Mr Grinch, love the garden, fabulous well stocked borders :D
I'm a big daylily fan too, lovely picture of 'Frans Hals' :D

 

Towards the end of summer 2006, i extended the patio at the back of the garden. The previous ownders had raised the area around the old one so it wasnt a problem. Why had they raised it ? At the time i did not know but i soon found out.
Winter 2006-7 came:


Snow and rain. I then discovered i had a problem and the reason why the area at the back of the garden had been raised.



The area at the back just would not drain. In fact the whole garden apart from the West facing border was VERY damp up until early summer and the bottom it was like a bog. But i perservered. I dug the East facing border, painted the kids wendy house and went with a damp border where the wet was worse.
From new patio:


April came and the plants started to grow.



Then May:



Then June:



to be continued...... :D

 

The damp/wet small border thrived:


BUT the whole wet effected the bottom end of the garden. You could not walk on the grass after it had rained and often you would have to wait 2 days before you could even mow the lawn. After speaking to the locals, they told us that years ago before most of the houses were built, there was a large ditch that ran from the top of our road to the bottom. This ditch would have been situated at the bottom of our garden and every house suffered the same. A filled in ditch coupled with clay meant the water went know where and what did go went very slowly.
It just wasnt practicle. We waited two years, in the meantime our 2nd child was born and we soon realised mud and kids do not mix.

The plants were thriving though:









But change was a foot......................... :D

 

October 2007:


I had enjoyed the garden but the wet at the bottom made it very difficult to use, especially the days following rain. The kids were growning bigger, they (and the wife) pestered me a play area. The only place i could put it without taking up too much of garden was the wet area, so i dug down a foot, filled with type 1 MOT, whacked it down, then filled it with play bark. The reason i dug so deep was that i thought this would act as a mini drain for the surounding area. The water would fill it but it would be hidden underneath the Type1 and bark. The play house was also moved closer to the house.

Even though i enjoyed my curves and informal cottage garden style, they were a pain. They often fell in, hard to repair and plants spilling over killing the grass underneath. With the advent of this new play area, the curves just didnt look right, so they were straightened.



I also wanted a formal area with a small box hedge closer to the house, just to break it up. My first attempt:





I found it difficult to mow, so the smaller formal part where re-designed.



Thats where i am at the minute. My plan is to patio this smaller formal area, this spring. Still keep the Box but widen the entrance to that patio.

Thats the plan. I also want to re stock the borders.

 

Very Nice

 

Not sure whether this should be continued on this thread as we have gone beyond the "hi" stage, but here goes.......

Yesterday spent the whole day diging out the patio area. I was well chuffed as i gave myself two days to do it. 3 hours AM, then break for the footy then 3 hours PM. The area is 3.6m x 3.6m about 13m2. Dug 6 inches down. The result was a 4yard skip worth of mud and turf. Jeez it was hard work with the heavy clay soil, but here's the result:



Next stage is for me and my Dad to lay the patio. Will match up to the existing one with the same patten. This will be done when the days get longer, perhaps March time.
Once this is done, the patio will be edged with Boxus wth two large golf ball Boxus plants that i bought last week marking the entrance to it.

G

 

Mr Grinch, I came on here just to say 'hello'...but I can't leave without saying 'good work!' too

 

Hello there and a big welcome. There are a few daylily fanatics on this site. Enjoy your gardening

 

Thanks Julie