Saturday is here! I wanted to work in the gardens today but the rain decided to beat me outside. I will have to wait. I love spring. Every thing starts to come back to life. It is like a fresh start for everything.
Year one: When we moved into our home, there was a very long garden in front of the house. Is is approx. 60 feet long by about 10-15 feet wide. It was filled with daylilies and pickers. I decided that I was going to "re-do" this patch and get rid of the day lilies to make room for a lot of different flowers. Has any one ever tried to get rid of day lilies? Don't get me wrong, the are pretty and I do like them but I did not want a whole garden full of them. They never die. You can never get rid of them. Ever! We have tried everything.
I tried cutting them down so I could at least see the ground. Then I thought, with all the time I have (ha ha), I will just dig them up and throw them in the waste pile in the back (soon to be a compost pile). My husband watched me spend entire weekends working so very hard digging these tubes up and taking the wheel barrow for the trek into the back yard to dump them. (We have 12 acres and this pile is in the far corner on the other side of the property). Pile after pile. I was going to get rid of these if it was the last thing I ever did. It almost was. Then my husband, being the very helpful loving husband that he is, made the biggest mistake of his life. He asked if I needed help. In tears, I said "yes, please." He is a strong man with a heart of gold. He dug this entire patch down 2 feet to try and eradicate all of these tubes for me. We piled the dirt on a trailer and made ATV jumps (another story for another day) with all the dirt. Then we went to the yard and garden center to get bags of dirt to fill the area back in. One trailer full of 60 bags of dirt outta do it. He filled in the patch, bag by bag, but it was not enough. I felt bad having him work so hard on this project of mine (really, I did) so I said I would take the truck and go get more dirt. I did not think I would need that much. Maybe another 50 bags or so.
I unhooked the trailer and left with the truck (Expedition). Do you know you can not put that much dirt in the back of a truck like this? I do now. I got back home and my hubby took one look at the truck which was almost to the ground in back, and said in his most loving voice, "hunny, what have you done?" I said, "what do you mean? I just got more dirt. Is something wrong?" Umm, dah! "Have you looked at the truck?" he asked. It was at that very moment I realized how very smart I actually am not. This also explains why the guy at the garden center looked at me funny as he brought the pallet full of dirt to my truck. I just thought he was a little strange or something. I have never left in the truck, from that day on, without talking to my husband about what I was taking the truck for and making sure that what I was going to get would be ok to put in the back of the truck.
Year two: With that over and done with, I continued to make this garden my dream garden. I received a lot of plants from my Aunt and Uncle. I planted each one in a carefully chosen spot in my new garden. They were so beautiful. I was out there all the time pulling weeds and tending to this garden that my husband and I poured our heart and souls into. You will never guess what happened next. All of those daylilies began to grow again. Each one, rising above the dirt, to meet the sun. I dug them out and with anger, threw them into the wheel barrow and off they went. My husband came out to check on my progress and made the second mistake of his life. "What is the matter hunny? Lots of weeds?" With tears in my eyes again I said, "they are still here. They will never be gone." He could not believe that with all the work we did the year before they were still there. He asked me what I wanted him to do. He knew how bad I wanted this garden. I said that I thought if we got some weed barrier they would not come through it. Silly, silly women! He did as I requested and picked up the weed barrier and left me to the task of carefully cutting it and placing it on top of the dirt and around my flowers, to once and for all, get rid of these things. We got mulch to place on top of that, (with the trailer this time and my hubby by my side) from the city garage. I did mention to him that I could handle this task alone but he would not think of it. Wonder why? He removed it from the trailer and shoveled it into the garden for me.
Year three: My beautiful garden is now a dream come true. You will never, ever guess the next sentence. Yes, the day lillies are much stronger than I anticipated and still grew though the weed barrier. I give up, they win. They are only here and there and I learned to just live with them in peace. I cannot battle them any longer. My husband is so happy with me that I learned to come to terms and live happily together, FOREVER, with the lilies. Oh, did I leave out some little point I should not have? Did I fail to mention my husband absolutely dislikes gardening? Hates it, hates, hates it! He never comes to check on me when I am in the garden anymore. Weird. From across the yard, he tells me how nice my garden looks. What a guy!
The garden is still a work in progress. I plan on adding more flowers this year as soon as the rain stops! More pictures to come.
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