Flower & Garden | Gardening in My Rubber Boots

Jul 5

Our NEW Backyard Sanctuary

This past week we finally finished our back patio. We took a little time off in June to visit France and England (it was a blast). But, when we came home to a giant dirt hole, we knew we needed to get the patio finished. After all, we’ve had the stone since April! To speed up the process I invited friends over for a tea party – giving us a week to get it all done.

The main reason for the new patio (beside it’s beauty) is to have a permanent home for our patio furniture and pots. Since we removed the lawn we’ll also have less mowing and watering. Plus, it’s great for our outdoor movie nights.

We used Tumbled Pennsylvania Bluestone since it’s the same type of stone used on the front walkway and we liked the different shapes of the stones. I wanted our patio to look natural and old – not perfect! We even left a space between the stones so a variety of ground cover would fill the gaps. So far the chickens have only eaten/devoured/destroyed the Blue Star Creeper.

To see my inspiration and before pictures you can check out a post I wrote a couple months ago: My Backyard Inspiration Picture.

Here’s my new patio:

New patio looking towards the house.

View of the back of the garage & veggie beds from the house.

Our fire pit & movie watching area. We've even got a spot set aside for an outdoor outlet.

Raised veggie & herb beds.

Pots filled with Creeping Jenny, Coleus, Bamboo, Heather & Midnight Wine Wiegela.

Coleus, Hebe & Variegated Holly.

Containers full of Coleus, Creeping Jenny, Hebe, Heather, Corkscrew Willow & Bonsai Maple.

Container filled with a young Dogwood, Heather, Coleus & Creeping Jenny.

Our backyard is now low maintenance and sustainable. I love it! Now, we relax.

Jun 6

8 Comments

It Was a Success? Seed GROW Project.

I’m happy to report that my TWO Nasturtium Spitfire Seedlings are now two months old. That’s right, out of an entire packet of seeds, I was able to germinate TWO seedlings. I’m rather proud of these two seedlings since I’d be a ‘nasturtium seed starting failure’ without them. After we chatted last month, I planted the remainder of the seeds directly in the garden to see what magic Mother Nature could do. Nothing.

I’m sure most people would disagree with me, but I’m finding Nasturtiums to be the hardest/most frustrating plant to start from seed. EVER. Here are a couple random shots of my two little fighters.

Nasturtium 'Spitfire' after two months (one month outside)

Closer look at my Nasturtium 'Spitfire' seedlings

You can follow my progress using my Seed GROW Project tag for this site.

You can read all the participating blog posts here on the Seed GROW Project site. Like all the other participants, I’ll be posting my progress every first Sunday of the month.

“I’m growing Nasturtium “Spitfire” for the GROW project. Thanks, to Renee’s Garden for the seeds.”

May 26

4 Comments