Home Garden, June 2000

Welcome to my neighborhood! It's looking a lot better now that all the municipal and personal landscaping is more or less finished. Just about everyone is a DIY gardener here, although many hired paving companies to enhance their porches and put in curbs or concrete edges. And there are still a few people on the block who put up those damned "pesticide" cautionary signs! Truly a green to die for, I suppose. Anyway, you get to see my carpet of clover (and it's never ever been sprayed, so you can let your babies romp on it).

There you go. This is my "Mother's Day Hedge" -- some of you may recall last year's garden journal entry when my neighbors thought I'd gone utterly mad (as opposed to just a little weird) and dug up someone else's hedge to plant in my own yard. And this is my wishing well, a prop from my sister's wedding in 1995. And of course, my beautiful carpet of clover. Some weed killer company actually approached me as I puttered (belly and all) in the front yard, and I could see the KA-CHING! in their eyes when they saw all the blooms... They offered to work up an estimate to get rid of all that clover right there. "Do you think this kind of coverage happens by ACCIDENT?" I responded. It's hard to keep that feral gleam out of my eyes when the weed patrols come by.

This is my newest bizarre addition to the garden: a Eucomis plant. It's also known as a "pineapple plant" because it has a spiky crown of leaves on top of the flower stem. The other plants around it are called liatris (which look a lot like single-stem lavender), and the little guy peeking up through the soil is my favorite lawn ornament. I have a picture of the eucomis in bloom still waiting to be developed, so you'll see that little square replaced by a true image soon enough.

Here's the result of my lasagna garden -- right under the sign that commands it to GROW, and between my Grandma Jane's roses. That tangle of green is actually a bed of snowpeas. I had my first homegrown snowpea dinner on July 6th, and I tell you: NOTHING beats reaping your own harvest! Even my Tiger ate one!

Return to the Sheeps' Pasture
Return to the Land of the Blue Sheep
Check out the neighborhood collage!