Trent went to see his folks this weekend and he took some pics of the yard to take along. It's a good thing he did, because what he didn't know was that I had a couple of tricks up my sleeve for this weekend, and these pics are now serving as the "before" shots. It still might be a little tough to make out the changes I made this weekend, but if that's the case, just nod and smile, nod and smile. Make like you can see all of my hard work and make my day!
Lamb's Quarters (purple tipped bushy plant at the left corner of the fence) and some suffering herbs and coleus. Lots of a volunteer sedum-type plant that is making me crazy. Note to sedum-type plant - I have recently discovered that you are no match for a little boiling water poured over your roots. Say good-bye, devil plant! I got a lot of this cleaned up and cut back Sunday, but forgot to take pics. Oh well. I focused on more important accomplishments...
Cantaloupe vines now growing up the fence, thanks to a little help from some pantyhose.
There were two nice, ripe cantaloupes growing along the fence that I sent with Trent to share with his folks. (Hiya, Dan and Jan!) I love it that they grew so well up there. Next year, I will train them up the fence from the start, and maybe retain more ground-space for the other plants I was trying to grow there.
That cantaloupe smelled soooo awesome! Before this year, I was so used to grocery-store cantaloupes and their general lack of flavor. I grew these on a whim, and was so very surprised at how aromatic they are even as you pick them. You can just smell how sweet they are going to taste.
Making silly faces!
That there is a baby cantaloupe my friends! In just a coupla weeks, it'll be in my belly!
Pay attention to the weed-choked aisle to the right of this bed.
That's the same aisle (on the left). See it? Get yourself a real good look there....
And check out this over-grown bed. The scraggly zinnias, the grass-like weeds all over the place, the orange zinnias swallowing up the salvia and a couple of other things. Hey mom, check out that rock rose to the left of the orange zinnias. That's the same one you gave me that was doing so poorly in the backyard. It is so full and lush now. I need to cut it back, but can't bring myself to! Got a lot of this weeded and cut some things back to give other things a chance. Again, forgot to get pics.
On Saturday, I accidentally cut the vine this watermelon was growing on. It's only about half formed right now, and I really didn't want to lose it. So I picked up the melon with an extra foot or so of vine and took it over to the bed I had cleared out last weekend. I tucked the end of the vine into the soil and have been watering it and watching it. The other part of the vine that I had cut withered before the dusk on Saturday. This vine made it through Saturday and Sunday. I'm keeping a close eye on it, trying to make sure it has enough water without making the vine or the melon rot. I haven't ever done this before and I didn't really have time to check it out online, so I'm just keeping my fingers crossed. I'm excited to see if it'll work!
Remember that aisle way from a few pictures up?! Look, look! This is what I did all weekend! This is the main project I wanted to finish before my hubby got home! They make it look sooooo easy on HGTV!! And it really is, but I was sort of doing two projects at once, AND I accidentally dug the trench for these pavers about twice as deep as I needed to. (That black stuff on the edge is the extra weed-cloth. Eventually that'll be hidden, but for now, it's busy blocking weeds as is!) The project took much longer than future iterations (I still have at LEAST 5 aisles to go, not to mention the center aisle and the two sides) will. I was working on this and filling the hole from the crape myrtle simultaneously. First, I had to cut all of the damned crape myrtle babies out. And there were many. It was a freakin' forest over there. Then I had to start moving the fill dirt from the original hole ( which had been moved into a pile in the back yard) back into the hole. So the work went like this:
- Dig out part of trench for pavers. Scoop dirt into bucket, lug bucket to wheelbarrow, dump, repeat.
- Fill wheelbarrow thusly, roll to back yard, dump.
- While still in the backyard, fill with backfill for crape myrtle hole, roll back to front yard.
- Fill bucket with soil (can't get wheelbarrow near the hole), lug bucket to hole, dump.
- Hose is running, filling the hole with water as I add the dirt, so that when the water drains out, the fill dirt will be as compacted as possible without renting heavy machinery. After dumping dirt into swirling pool 'o' mud, stir muck with pitch fork. Whilst doing splits over 3.5 ft-across hole. Careful not to fall in!
- Repeat until wheelbarrow is empty, reload wheelbarrow with dirt from trench.
- Repeat this cycle 4 or 5 times between Saturday and Sunday.
- Dig paver trench twice as deep as necessary (insert string of curse words here)!
- Shovel dirt back into paver trench. Level, tamp, measure, get more dirt from backyard.
- Shovel second wheelbarrow load of dirt back into trench. Level, tamp (hit my toes not once but TWICE - more curse words here), measure. Sigh of relief. Good enough for government work!
- Soak tamped fill dirt with boiling water to kill off any active weed seeds or roots.
- Lay weedcloth, cardboard, decomposed granite, pavers, pea gravel...
- Check for center after adding pea gravel. Should have done this before! More cursing.
- Scootch one half of the pavers to the left an inch, relevel a couple of them, redistribute the pea gravel.
- Stand up. Almost pass out. Steady self by grabbing handle of tamper. Admire work when vision returns. Sigh deeply. Upend a beer. Yay, beer.
I know it's hard to see, but there is sort of a depression in the soil here. This is the hole the crape myrtle was in. Wish I had a "before" pic, but I don't. There's a couple more wheelbarrows full of fill dirt in the backyard, but I should be able to get this finished next weekend.
Some watermelons were growing under cover of vineage! Yay. This one is about 2 feet long.
This one is between the size of a softball and... some other kind of bigger ball.
This area was the other goal that I wanted to accomplish before Trent got home. This is the path from the front door to the side gate, and it was completely choked with my tools, dead plants, rotting chairs, blah, blah, blah. With all of the weeds in the main aisles of the yard, and this alternate route so blocked, getting the dogs in and out for walks was getting difficult. I got rid of two chairs and some clutter, moved the dead plants to a staging area for composting, moved my tools, etc. Swept...Found the cute little blue table at "Wallyland" for a song!
This is the orphaned watermelon. My fingers are crossed that it'll keep on keepin' on and I'll get to eat that beauty! Mmmm, watermelon!! It's about the size of a flat volleyball about now. It could get two or three times that size.
Another tiny baby. Not all of the buds that start to turn into fruit make it. Sometimes they just shrivel up for no real reason. When they get to be this size, I'm pretty sure I'm going to get to harvest them. Mmm!
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