This is the time of year when I start thinking about planting stuff, transplanting stuff and ripping stuff out. It's yard season!
I like to get all the hard work done by early June so that I don't spend the whole summer sweating in the sun. I burn easily!
On Saturday we found a little divot in the lawn. I kind of pushed on it with my foot and my foot sank quickly. I grabbed a shovel and pushed the handle into ground and it sank several feet. I called my neighbor Fred over for a consultation.
He suggested I might have found a burrow of some sort or a sink hole. I thought sink holes only happened in Florida. This is not covered in my home improvement books.
I've poked around a little more and I think I've actually found some kind of exposed well or something. It looks like the hole has a brick mouth or something. Mysterious.
Guess what we'll be doing on Saturday? Excavating! For now, the hole is blocked off with a tomato cage.
Safety first. Now to solve the mystery of who pruned my hydrangeas.
Labels: 2007, yard
By: Alyssa | Tuesday, May 01, 2007 at Tuesday, May 01, 2007 | | 
About six months ago Deeps and I spent a weekend digging holes. Lots and lots of holes to plant a lot of spring bulbs.
We dug holes for 300 bulbs.
We opted for this solution for a few reasons a) bulbs are cost-effective over time if you pick the right ones and b) my husband hates gardening so he's really embraced low maintenance perennials.
A few months after planting our bulbs we had a freaky spot of warm weather in December and early January. My bulbs sprouted and started to grow. Some of them really got going; I knew that would be trouble.
Then the deep freeze of February rolled in and the newly sprouted plants died. Even my luscious looking rosemary plant finally went dormant. The winter was so warm - for a while - that I thought I'd gotten some mystical evergreen rosemary plant.
Now it's April and daffodils are sprouting around town, but not in my back yard. I haven't mentioned to Deeps that we may need to spend another weekend digging holes. I don't have the heart to break the news yet.
Meanwhile, the squirrels have been digging like fiends in the lawn and the garden beds. I think they're working for
evil Blue Jays.
Labels: 2007, evil bird, yard
By: Alyssa | Tuesday, April 10, 2007 at Tuesday, April 10, 2007 | |
I've been using
Twitter for a couple of weeks now, at the urging of
a friend and a
fellow podcaster. They both make good cases for using it - it's easy, it's fun and it's a very easy way to keep a finger on the pulse of your personal network.
Then I come along.
I've twittered about the following items:
Drinking coffee
Blogging
Painting the hallway
Anna Nicole Smith
I'm sure you see a trend, good reader. I'm as boring on Twitter as I am on my blog and - one could argue - as I am in person.
This weekend I hope to do some twittering about
my yard, cleaning out the closet and maybe vacuuming. Definitely vacuuming. The rug is looking a little rough.
I keep it real people.
Labels: 2007, internet, weird stuff, yard
By: Alyssa | Friday, March 30, 2007 at Friday, March 30, 2007 | |
I can wield shame like a cudgelWe bought a big, powerful and loud gas-powered lawn mower a few weeks ago. After last summer’s debacle of trying to manage our grass with the old reel push mower, we opted to upgrade to a bigger gas mower. The reel mower didn’t do a very good job and frankly our yard was too big for it.
This year our condo neighbors agreed with us that we should upgrade and three of us hopped into the car to visit the giant orange box store of despair. I looked at a nice electric that didn’t do everything I hoped our new mower could do. Then I looked at the gas-powered machines. Our neighbor had “done some research” and made some suggestions about which mower to buy. Deeps chimed in and we bought a big self-propelled machine that will mow and mulch.
When we got the machine home the men set about fiddling with it. They seemed quite pleased with themselves. And they both commented on how much faster the lawn mowing task would be – mere minutes compared with the nearly hour-long task it had been with the reeler mower.
They both said they’d be more inclined to mow the lawn now that they could do it in less than 15 minutes. Both said it would be something they could easily do after work. Neither of them ever did anything. So I had to start my slow guilt campaign.
I didn’t actually care that they didn’t mow the lawn, it’s just they made such a big deal about that mower that on principle I felt they should do some lawn care and maintenance. I’ve shamed Deeps into doing it twice. It’s harder to shame the neighbor since he’s not around a lot and seems somewhat impervious to my shame – after all I’ve done all the yard work to date and dug up the whole back yard to reseed and overplant it for the lush green lawn we have now.
I figure a good few minutes loudly struggling with the mower should do the trick. Then I can spend some quality time with the Weedeater.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Monday, May 29, 2006 at Monday, May 29, 2006 | |
The politics of green grassI’ve alluded to my lawn a lot. Living in New England, I don’t deal with the same issues my friends in California deal with: a never-ending growing season and a real lack of water.
Just yesterday I was chatting with Em and she mentioned that
the sprinklers were out in force in her neighborhood. Em and I both have conflicted feelings about water and drought and growing stuff – we both grew up in areas where farming was a big deal and I guess that makes us a little more aware of the risks involved with growing stuff in the world.
The biggest risk, I think, is lack of water. (Too much is certainly a problem as well – but I’m not focusing on that.)
I’m looking at my tri-colored back yard, about 3000 square feet. It’s not huge, but it is big enough for us. And it is big enough to get me thinking about what to do with it – I didn’t do enough thinking before I threw down some grass seed a couple of months ago. I know grass needs a decent amount of water to keep going – about 1 inch a week for an existing lawn, even more if you are starting a lawn.
Supplemental watering is important if you want to maintain it – but if you’re not inclined to spend the money (we have to pay a pretty penny for our water) you can come up with some creative options:
rain barrels parked under the downspout, alternative landscaping or drought tolerant grass or
even clover.
I did a tiny bit of research this week about what I could plant along with my grass – I just ordered some white clover seed. According to some of the information I’ve read it should do okay in dry weather and will help the soil by providing nitrogen. I think that also means I won’t have to do so much fertilizing to keep the grass fed.
In the front of the house where we once had a tiny lawn I’ve taken out all of the grass and put down lots and lots of pebbles and small, drought tolerant plants like coreopsis. I water them when I remember and they do okay from early summer through the fall.
I’m not sure I’ll ever take out all off the grass, but I think I could see having a small field of short clover going happily in the back. You can cut it, it stays green and it is easier to maintain. Even crabgrass looks a little more appealing – last year it lived lush and green despite no rain or watering from me. Again, I just kept it short and it didn’t look that bad.
Being a new homeowner is hard, I make plenty of bad decisions (like no backsplash behind the kitchen sink!) and now I work to try to fix them. I didn’t give my lawn a lot of thought, but upon further consideration I think I can do something that won’t disgrace the neighborhood, break my budget or make anyone in the household unhappy.
By the way, if you think all this angst is crazy - we're just talking about grass - you should hear the discussions about what kind of
lawnmower we should have. You'd think we were talking about putting the Poopus to sleep or something. Clearly it is angst season.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Saturday, April 29, 2006 at Saturday, April 29, 2006 | |
Two ToneMy grass is finally growing and has mostly filled in – except for a few bare patches. I’ll be dealing with them on Saturday. However, the lawn has now come in three different colors: OG (original grass), quick growing seed (which didn’t actually grow in that quick because it was freakily cold) and regular sun/shade seed.
Some of the grass is going to require mowing this weekend – but not all of it. I think Big Al and Slim are going to visit this June and we’ve got to get the yard in order. Or suffer further yard shame. I was so focused on keeping the grass going that I might have neglected to water some of the little flowers I planted in the new side bed. Whoops.
I’m not used to keep stuff alive on such a large scale! My stupid hydrangeas are still alive. And the ugly shrub in front of the house is finally starting to look like more than a twig collection.
This weekend I’m going to buy a lawnmower. Do not get too excited, Internets.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Friday, April 28, 2006 at Friday, April 28, 2006 | |
Questions from a marriage #198Deeps: Did you tape some stuff last night on the DVR?
Me: Uh, maybe.
Deeps: Are you responsible for “
Grow it and Mow it!”?
Me: Hmm.
Deeps: You taped something about growing grass?
Me: Possibly.
Deeps: You have a problem.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Friday, April 21, 2006 at Friday, April 21, 2006 | |
Yard envyWe worked all weekend in the yard. Well, almost all weekend. We built the veg patch, we pulled together all the old grass piles and tossed them into lawn bags, I whacked on that ugly bush a bit more. And we planted some new myrtle. Oh myrtle, you remind me of my Nana’s friends, but we like you anyway.
I also dumped tons of dirt on the ground (okay – more like 200 pounds of dirt) and put down even more grass seed. Because grass will grow or else. Our neighbor Fred made many encouraging noises, of course he has a lush patch of green and I have a pile of dirt and dead grass.
Later, we did manage to pull ourselves together and go to a party at the French Connection’s house.
The French Connection has a lot of interesting friends – she’s international, you know – and we mingled all night. But, clearly, I’m not as interesting because she kept introducing me as a “famous blogger.”
I’m not sure how to feel about that. I don’t deny blogging, but I think most people don’t understand the variations of blogger – I clearly fall into the self-delusional, narcissistic, personal blogger category. I have not changed any regimes and didn't bring down Dan Rather or anything. And I’m most certainly not famous.
In addition to not being famous I’m incredibly boring (see above). My best material probably shows up here. So that sad fact is that if you are a friend or acquaintance that I see on a regular basis, you’re going to be disappointed. I vet all my stories in the blog first before I trot them out at the water cooler or at a cocktail party. Be warned.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Tuesday, April 04, 2006 at Tuesday, April 04, 2006 | |
More than dirt
This is what my yard looks like after several hours of work with a hoe, a wheelbarrow, several hunded pounds of dirt (that's special grass seed dirty), fertilizer and some grass seed. That grass had better grow or I will be forced to kick someone's butt.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Sunday, March 26, 2006 at Sunday, March 26, 2006 | |
Where fescue goes to die
That pile of old grass, dirt and branches over there? Yeah - that's where I'm fixin' to put my vegetable garden in a few weeks. Luckily, the yard waste collection starts again in a couple of weeks. Otherwise, my jalapenos would have no place to grow. Also - that ugly shrub? It is not long for this world.
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | at Sunday, March 26, 2006 | |
A lawn, thirty-nine kids, sniffles, and a poodle in a red sweaterJust got back from our big trip to Indianapolis. We had to reschedule it from last month thanks to a labor dispute with a major airline. The sad thing is, given the current state of US airliners – that is not specific enough information for you to determine who the carrier is.
Anyway, we’re back. We saw all the kids including: 39 kids. I’m not sure there were 39 – but it seemed like. I might have been counting some of them multiple times. They all had the sniffles and are short and move around a lot. It’s hard to keep track of them without tagging them in some way – which I’m not allowed to do (thanks Slim!).
Today I’m attacking the lawn. It was 50 degrees all weekend in Indy – today we’re clocking in around 35 in beautiful Arlington. I figure the ground is only partially frozen. My dad’s lawn in a late winter, dormant state looks about 300x better than my lawn ever looked when it was alive (last seen alive sometime in July).
I’m raking up dead crab grass like a muther and my arms are tired. On the bright side, it means I don’t have to go to the gym because seriously – I’m doing hours of yard work. And taking a little break to blog because I know you people like it when I write about fescue and such.
Oh and there’s a poodle in a red sweater loose in our town. He/she has been on the run for a couple of weeks. I have read dozens of emails (from the town list) about him/her and the various spottings. I am seriously considering making a Google map for him/her.
Because it is hilarious how totally elusive this dog is and how damn near everyone in town is trying to capture it.
More later – including pictures, demographic analysis of Indianapolis (the city has exploded) and my thoughts about my family (thumbnail: they’re nuts).
Labels: 2006, yard
By: Alyssa | Monday, March 20, 2006 at Monday, March 20, 2006 | |
Walk softly and carry a chainsawWhen I smell
skunks in the morning, I know it can only mean one thing – spring is getting closer.
Well, that and our car is probably going to reek for the next couple of days. Good thing we’re not in a carpool.
And spring means that we should start thinking about what we’d like to do – you know, the homeowner projects that we got so good at last year.
I’ve been doing some math and I think we’re going to have to delay the massive deck project until 2007. Disappointing – yes – I had t-shirts picked out for my free laborers, but we have other projects as well.
For example, we have several large and hideous shrubs that need to go. They are so large and hideous that I was convinced they were trees until Big Al came out to visit.
And I
killed all the grass last year (that and months of no real rain) so I should try to bring it back this year. I made some success in the fall when I tried to reseed. I’ll redouble my efforts, as the ground becomes less frozen and more hospitable to growth.
What does all of this mean for you, dear readers? It means more
fun action photos and
before and after shots. And if you’re lucky, you’ll get up-to-the-minute coverage of all my project-related trips to the hospital. Because it wouldn’t be fun if there wasn’t a little blood and some crying.
Labels: 2006, skunk, yard
By: Alyssa | Thursday, March 02, 2006 at Thursday, March 02, 2006 | |
