Hey, check it out - I garden-ed!

[ZipperJJ]

Last summer was the first summer in my new house, with my .5 acre yard that hadn’t been looked after in 20 years.

With a lot of help from my friends, relatives and even my neighbors, I got a LOT done. It was such hard work, I cursed my yard every single day. There was a never-ending list of crap to take care of. Trees to cut down, bushes and hedges to tear out/move, thorny berry patches to obliterate, an old grape vine to fix up, trees to prune, old wood to clean up and move, tons of trash to be tossed out, new flower beds to install, a whole house to paint…man, that was just part of it!

Not to mention it was extremely hot last summer and I didn’t get any air conditioning when I moved in (what was I thinking?) and I spent 10 hours every weekend helping with construction on a church.

Anyway, I swore up and down that I HAYTED gardening and taking care of my yard, and this year I was going to be as grumbly as last year.

But you know what? My yard looks absolutely beautiful this year. Turns out all that hard work paid off. The trees aren’t gnarly, the patches of grass I planted grew in, the mulch I put down stayed in-tact and the plants the neighbor put in my new flower bed last year look great.

So this year…this week actually…I went out and was…happy to work in the yard! So far I have weeded the front flower bed, dug out circles of grass around the front trees for mulch, cleaned up an area around my foundation that had been excavated, sprayed some weed killer in certain spots, sprayed some foundation bug control and tomorrow 3 yards of mulch is coming and I’m taking the day off work to spread it.

My yard work (aside from mowing) is half done and it’s not even June yet! And it looks so great, I’m giddy.

I took pictures of the front of my house before I painted it and ripped out the shrubs. In a coupla days I will post the pics to “show off” the work (I had asked the Dopers for color selection help).

Other first-time gardeners and homeowners feel free to gush here too!

[Savannah]

Bumping for pictures!

We had a similar situation, but not nearly as much as space to tame. I, too, really enjoy going outside and working in the yard now, although I’m still amazed by how much work it can be! Damn nature, always making a mess by dropping leaves and growing weeds…

[twickster]

My sidekick at work, inspired by our subject matter, has been involved in a fairly ambitious “spruce up the yard” project. He announced the other day that he figures they’ll finish this weekend, at which point he’ll be done with gardening.

I totally cracked up.

[Sattua]

Oh, lucky you. I’ll be buying my own first house this summer, and I can hardly wait to start the gardening. I really hope that there’s very little in place, because I want to do MY thing in it. Looking at bedding plants actually hurts, right now, because I can’t buy them yet. Le sigh.

So sick of the un-garden-able rental house. Cut those ugly spruces down!!!

[Siege]

I don’t have a yard, but I do have a nice balcony. Last summer I grew a nice batch of herbs. Making some rather tasty lamb with the sage and rosemary I’d grown myself. Yes, I was proud. At the end of the season, I set aside the ones I hadn’t used to dry. Early this spring, I opened the paper bags I’d been drying them in to be greeted with the smell of wonderful, herby goodness.

This, however, is where the story takes a turn for the worse. You see, I was going to have Easter dinner with my parents, so I offered Mum the rosemary and sage to be used with the lamb. She agreed and I dropped my entire stock off a few days before Easter. She didn’t give me the unused herbs when I left on Easter Sunday, but I didn’t think anything of it. I did ask about them when I phoned the next day. That’s when Mum told me she’d thrown them out. It seems they were rather old and dried-up looking. :eek: All I could do was tell her that yes, it was all right, and no, I didn’t mind. I mean, she’s my mother. Telling her what she’d done wouldn’t help anything, right? Oh well. It was an excuse for another trip to Penzey’s to replace them.

This year, I’m getting braver – I’m trying growing herbs and flowers from seed!