Gardening

So, one of the items on my spring break to do list was to finish de-sodding the hill in front of the house and to plant the whole thing with herbs.  I can officially call this one "done done" as opposed to "done but" which is how most projects around here stand.

This is a pic to remind you what the house looked like when we bought it:

Lots of big ugly bushes and some weedy grass.  On a big hill.  Dumb.  So the first summer we had it (can you believe it's been almost two years?) we sawzall'ed (great word) the bushes to open up the yard.  Last year, I started removing the sod from the hill and planted a few herbs.  You can read about it here in this post.  The herbs did magnificently and now look like this:

Se how big those lavender got?  They are HUGE and gorgeous.

Oddly enough, the soil in the front yard is pretty decent.  The mint, thyme, and oregano took off like wildfire too.  And, I had thrown in about 50 red tulip bulbs last fall that I bought from the kids.  They were gorgeous (stupid me, I didn't take a picture).  You can see in this picture that I'd stripped the sod all off and had started to plant.  I've planted 8 thyme plants, 3 oregano, 2 mint, 8 different types of basil, 6 different types of peppers, 4 more lavender, tansy, tarragon, parsley, chives, chamomile, curry (weird plant and smells funny but pleasant), and a tomato.  It is difficult to photograph, but here's my attempt:

Curry Plant:

So here is what it looked like last year:

And what it looks like today:

Big difference, right?  Better, right?  And those lavender!

I have pretty closely stuck to the "free or food" rule in the landscaping.  I bought my plants exclusively from local sources.  Maymont's Herbs Galore plant sale, City Garden's plant sale, and LDHS's plant sale.  

In the "free" category, a friend gave me a bunch of red hot pokers (kniphofia) and they have bloomed beautifully:

Back Yard: 

Where I broke the rule was in purchasing some hydrangeas from a lady in the neighborhood.  She had lost a couple of trees in her back yard changing her shady ground to sunny and her shrubs were burning.  So, I picked up three hydrangeas from her and planted them in the back yard.  

From the LDHS plant sale, I picked up that flat of impatiens in lovely red and white.  Given that the bird bath is simply a breeding ground for West Nile, I decided it needed a new raison d'être.  I moved it to the corner and planted a bunch of the red and whites in there.  I think it looks pretty dang good.  I know I need to pinch them back, but I wanted them to establish themselves for a few days first.  No need to shock them unnecessarily to quickly.

I also picked up a Japanese maple from a vendor at the South of the James farmer's market on Saturday.  I believe it's a Hisaka Yama.  Where I want to plant is unfortunately obstructed by the "sidewalk to nowhere" which I really hate.  So, Saturday, I pulled out my trusty sledge hammer and started to whack at it, much to P's consternation.  In an hour, I had this:

I think I'm going to continue the break up job over the summer.  I'm going to use the big chunks to build the fire pit in the middle of the yard.  Reduce, reuse, and recycle!

This is a close up of the maple.  I love the variegation.

Back Door Project

Sorry for the bloggy hiatus.  We are back on track now.

Well, I got damn little of my list accomplished over spring break.  Why is it I always think I'm going to get more done than I do?  Am I that slow? ambitious? disconnected from reality?  all of the above?  Something like that.

I didn't touch the staircase and it mocks me every time I climb the stairs, which is far too frequently.  I didn't pick up the paint deck, caulk the terrace, measure for wallpaper, or price out shelving.

So, what sucked out time so much?  Stripping the paint off the back door trim.  This is what it looked like when we moved in.  Thousands and thousands of layers of ugly paint.  All the detail on the trim was obscured and that hideous nicotine-mustard yellow color.  The wall area below the window was covered in plastic tiles (who thought that was a good idea?) that bulged out so that the drawers just out of the right side of the frame wouldn't open all the way.  It was pretty damned ugly.

Last fall we stripped and painted the back door.

 As you can see in the pic above, P had started to strip the trim and the plastic tiles had started to pop off.  Lovely to look at, no?

This is pretty much how things stayed for a very long time.

Then, the neighbor put her house on the market (sold in 6 days!) and posted pics of her house.  Behind all that plastic tile lay the old ice box.  We knew it was there, but the neighbor had all of hers all in tact and restored and gorgeous.  I forgot to save the pic, I'm a lousy blogger.  So, we decided to start banging off all those tiles and see if the bulgy wall hid perfect doors awaiting our restoration:

 Oh, the anticipation is like waiting for Heraldo to open Al Capone's vault!

 Just like Heraldo, disappointment awaits.

So, now we had a huge hole, no doors to restore, and a mess to clean up.  What are we going to do with said hole?

A beverage fridge!  It honors the old while incorporating the new, exactly what we wanted!

Lowes

So, after some stripping and cutting out of the middle bar, the hole looked about like this:

So, in lieu of more interesting progress, I started working on the transom.  It's a three light transom and I knew I wanted some art glass in there.  We pulled out the transom and I took it to the basement and started stripping it, breaking all three panes in the process.  This makes me wonder if I'll be able to rehab the rest of the windows any more successfully.  

Anyway, P suggested a fleur de lis motif that sort of corresponds to the dining room stenciling.  So this is what I ended up with:

Installing it was quite a bugger and there was a lot of swearing involved.  Mostly cause we are both short and the ladders weren't making us tall enough.  

So, this is where we are now.  I've still got to do one more coat of paint and the door trim is FINALLY done.  Please don't ask me when the hole will be done.  That's to be determined.  We have a handyman friend coming tomorrow, so we shall see what he says.

I've also made a discovery, I'm a very good list maker but not a list follower.  I make great lists to then turn around and ignore.  Some people make lists in order to cross off items.  I just make lists and then find other things to do.  So much for organization.  

Keep checking back, I've got several more posts in the queue planned.