I spent this morning weeding, like I seem to do most days. I live on a two acres with my husband and three children. The front half of the block is dedicated to being an ornamental garden and where the house sits. The back half has the vegie garden, chook pen, potting shed, dam, orchard, two sheds which house all the bits and peices and my mothers unit. Pretty much every square inch of land is used in some way.
I was weeding a round garden bed that is home to a rather fine tree. I don’t know the name of it. It was a seedling in a pot of plants from a freinds neighbour. A rather round about way to obtain plants, but you know how it goes. This tree, when it is all grown up, will be very big and shady, well I hope mine will be like its parents – they are lovely. Apparently its only fault is that the leaves don’t break down terribly well in the garden, they tend to matt together, however I will face that dilema when it arrives. Underneath this tree I have planted carnations – grown from seed and allysum – the white variety, also from seed. They have looked fantastic for the past few years, but it is now time to revamp the bed, give it a new lease on life. So I weeded it. I have some more carnations in pots to replace those that have died – cuttings from the original plants, and I think I will spread some seed possibly some pansies or johhny jumpups. Mind you, by the time I get around to all this the plan may have changed completely.
The best part of all this weeding – apart from a garden bed that looks slightly naked, was discovering the first jonquil pushing its leaves through the soil. There are lots in that bed, but this is the only one game enough to show it leaves this early in the year. Each year I look forward to the jonquil flowers and love the perfume, even though it does give me hayfever, but it is a much needed lift when I walk past that bed on the way to the clothes line. It is such a pity that the brown leaves are so unsightly afterwards. Still, if I was organised, I would plant so that these dying leaves are hidden.
How lovely to ‘meet’ you, Calidore. I hope you enjoy being a blogger.
Your garden sounds lovely with always something to do. You obviously like alyssum, too. I chose my blog name because it’s a common name for alyssum, which I love for its refreshing white flowers against green foliage.
With the leaves from your big tree – can you rake them onto the lawn and then go over them with the lawnmower to shred them so that they will break down more quickly.