and the landscaping continues..

We've spent the last few weeks clearing out the yard even more (yet there's still lots to do), planting a little in  hopes that we'll be able to enjoy the fruits of our labor next year, and most importantly we've been taking advantage of our outdoor space.  Because we've spent the last five summers in New York City traffic (like most New Yorkers we left the city every weekend and without fail got caught on the FDR for hours at a time) we are thrilled to be able to avoid major roads, stay home and still get to enjoy the warm weather, smell of fresh cut grass and hamburgers on the grill.  So with that goal in mind we worked our bottoms off trying to get everything ready for the unofficial start of the summer- Memorial Day Weekend.

Our "Privacy" Bushes
Our plan was always to plant along Division Street- in hopes that obstructing Henry's view might bring a little peace and quiet to the neighbors- as much as I'm sure they all enjoy his following them along the perimeter of our lawn barking (more like screeching) along the way.  We opted to go with round arborvitaes- just to be a little different..




I could joke about how you can barely even see the house anymore (I tend to joke about it with Ben all too often), but we're crossing our fingers they'll grow very quickly.. for the neighbors' sake!

The Patio
The patio turned out to not actually be a disaster.  Can you believe it?  Once we got our furniture on and grass started to grow in between the pavers, it started taking shape.  I'm looking forward to seeing what it looks like at the end of the summer and whether or not the grass will just take over (there's a lot of finger crossing at our house).  If all goes according to plan the patio will stay, but we're open to re-doing it next spring if need be.
You'll notice above, Ben also planted three of the arborvitae's around the patio (two in the back and one to the left).



The Lily Garden
Originally the yard had a random lily garden in the middle of the yard.  Ben tried to kill it a few times in hopes of growing normal grass, but it didn't work.  So instead we opted to dig them out and plant them in front of the house. 



It took a lot of time and energy, but it was worth it- even if it's temporary.

The Vegetable Garden
My vegetable garden has become my pride and joy.  I call it mine because Ben says it's my responsibility- I think he's worried that I'm going to just give up on it if I don't see any vegetables growing after a few weeks time.  I'm sure he's right, but at the moment it's growing so I'm loving it and the fact that I actually did something right!  We opted to go with a raised bed because we weren't sure if anything would really grow in our dirt.  So Ben built the frame and then we positioned it in the best area with the most light.



I got rid of the weeds and grass underneath and started filling it with lots of different stuff..


Finally I planted all 15 varieties of fruits and vegetables and Ben offered to water for me..

I decided to plant tomato plants instead of seeds (maybe next year I'll get gutsy and go with the seeds), but everything else I planted was seeds. 

Everything has grown a lot in the last few days- I'll keep posting updates, but in the meantime I'm hoping this weekend we'll get back to the interior of the house before we start scraping and painting the exterior.  I'd love to get the rest of the trim work installed and painted and start working on the doors before all of our guests start arriving for track season!

winter planting

Ben sent me pictures of the house in progress last night and I'll be sure to post them early next week. By then I'll be able to follow them up with shots of the final product (final meaning primed but still not painted).

In the meantime I thought I'd share our winter planting adventures- for a few laughs!

About three weeks ago Ben was offered a couple of "bushes" and because we are desperately in need of some landscaping around the house, he didn't want to pass them up. Thinking it would be easy to load them into the back of his truck and bring them home, he was more worried about getting them into the ground- the Weather Channel was calling it one of the coldest weeks of the year.

I wasn't entirely sure of Ben's plans and was on my way out the door when he called me and said "get ready, I'm on my way home and I've got two TREES in the back of my truck." Meaning a) they were clearly bigger than bushes and b) I was actually going to have to help plant them! When Ben first mentioned we might have to do a little landscaping he actually used the word "I" and he didn't say it was going to have to be done on the coldest day of the week (I'm pretty sure it was 15 degrees outside)!

Before I get on with the story I just want to mention for those of you who don't know, I have the opposite of a green thumb and made it very clear when we first bought the house that Ben would in charge of the landscaping and I would stick to the interior of the house.

Anyway, Ben pulled the truck up to the front of the house and soon realized getting the "bushes" (particularly the 500lb. one wedged in front) was not going to be so easy.
He started chipping away at the frozen roots to try to break some of the excess dirt off. He was hoping it would lighten the load a little, but it was too frozen and little to no progress was being made.
After much frustration it became very clear that the only way we were going to get the bush out of the back of the car was by tying a rope to it, tying a rope to a nearby tree on our property..
and Ben pulling the truck away.. very quickly!
In the meantime, I was running in and out of the house to warm up.
Once the tree fell off the truck, we shockingly were able to pretty easily dig a hole..
And then the bigger issue became getting the tree into the hole.. as it was way too heavy to drag ourselves.
Ben was able to hitch it to the truck and drag it a little closer and he continued to try to chip away at it with no luck.

After a few more minutes of frozen fingers and toes, we opted to call it a day. We dropped the other (much lighter) bush into the hole..
and decided next time we'll wait for the ground to thaw before we make any landscaping decisions!

Ben was able to cut the bigger bush up and get rid of the branches, but the frozen stump is still hanging out in our yard- as it will until the temperature warms up.