Hey there and happy spring! Although, depending on where you’re reading from, it may still be winter yet, or even well into a toasty summer. Last year around this very week of May we had snow (annoying but not surprising), and I know the southern and western states are well into thunderstorm season.
Here, it’s the sweet time of year where the skies are a brilliant and cloudless blue, the sun is bright (and up for the day before 5:30am), the grass is a very rich green, dandelions dot the fields and meadows around our neighborhood, our daily soundscape is punctuated by the incessant humming of lawn mowers and string trimmers, a moderate breeze lingers day and night rippling through the trees and various yard shrubs (which are populated with white, pink, and magenta buds), and the temperature hovers in the perfect low-to-mid 60s – when it isn’t raining that is (so, every other week, as it roughly works out to be). The lilacs and magnolias are blooming and thriving (and smell heavenly), boldly colored tulips are in their prime, my rhubarb are flourishing, and this past week our neighborhood pond has been filled with the first of many families of brand new, fuzzy, yellow baby geese and a sweet little flock of cygnets that the mamma swan we’ve been watching for the past few months welcomed on Mother’s Day (appropriately).
Like last year, I’ve enjoyed being home and in more natural settings much more than usual since I am still working from home, and this affords me the flexibility to enjoy a lot of things I may have otherwise missed while working downtown and focusing on a busy morning routine of getting dressed, getting a lunch made and packed, loading the car, and commuting early in the mornings. Instead, I start my day with a several mile walk where I notice the change in seasons – the smells, the sights, the plant life, the animals (mostly owls and rabbits and the pups of the neighborhood, with occasional fox, deer, turkey, and plenty of birds), and how it all subtly shifts from day to day and week to week. I usually have breakfast and tea or coffee on the back patio or deck when it’s still early and chilly out, but the sun is warm and cozy. During the days, when I look up from my projects or take a break, I look out at the view of our lawn and trees and my rhubarb and the bird feeders. This is also when the lawn mowers are the most active. In the winter we put out suet feeders that attracted quite a multitude of feathered guests, and now we have a newly placed hummingbird feeder that we are hoping yields a few of those flighty fellas on a semi-regular basis. In the evenings, we also walk sometimes down to the pond before sunset to check in on the swans, frogs, snapping turtle, and other wildlife, or have dinner and wine out on the deck when daylight stretches well past dinnertime. This is when most of our neighbors are out walking their dogs, grilling dinner, taking a leisurely stroll, sitting in front of a gas fire pit on their driveway with a beer or wine, hosting a round of lawn games, and kids are riding bikes or playing ball. In another month or two, it will be hotter (or more humid) and these activities will occur earlier in the mornings and later at night, along with the frequent chugging, clucking, and hissing of lawn sprinklers and the desperate dodging of mosquitos at dusk when everyone darts back inside. But for now, there’s no shortage of outdoor enjoyment.
We’ve been busy these past few months making plans to bolster our own outdoor enjoyment with some landscape renovations. When we bought the house in January of 2019 there was a large stamped concrete patio out back with only a single (temporary) step down to it from the back patio door, and a little bit of mulch landscaping surrounding the house with a spattering of purple and green perennials: hostas, chives that blossom purple in the summer, lavender (a favorite to both myself and the bumble bees), a purple flowering sage, a purple iris plant, a few Elijah blue grass shrubs, and several hardy azalea bushes. Last summer we designed and added an awesome deck out back off the stamped concrete patio that constantly receives compliments from passerby’s on the bike path that runs through the far part of our backyard (we do love this deck and think it’s one of the best things we’ve done to and for this house), and we also added a stamped concrete walkway from the driveway to the front porch. But the mulch landscaping, which wasn’t all that great to begin with (though the plants themselves are nice) was looking pretty run down, and we’re not big into the upkeep, maintenance, or even the look of mulch itself.
Long story short, we’re gearing up for phase 1 of a new landscaping installation to start in a few weeks – a mix of re-homing the current plants to our neighbors and friends, burying the gutters off our house, adding stone edging, replacing the mulch with stone gravel, adding a step and walkway down to a new stone fire pit area, re-grading and leveling out portions of the lawn, re-seeding the grass in those areas, and adding a tree to the front yard and maybe one to the backyard as well. Hopefully, if it all goes as planned and looks how we envision it will upon completion, we’ll have a lovely backyard oasis to enjoy for years to come. You know, in a few months after the new grass grows in. I’m mentally preparing myself to say goodbye to the expanses of lush, healthy green lawn we’ve been cultivating for the past two year that I’ve grown fond of and to accept that, at least for a period of time this summer until the new grass grows in, our yard is just not going to look all that great – even with all the nice new hardscaping details. It’s also a big change to go from mulch to stone, and from large expanses of only grass to less grass with more stone and hardscaping.
Phase 2 (maybe starting in the fall, but in all likelihood next spring and into next summer) will be adding a composite decking boardwalk that matches our deck to the gravel fire pit area, perhaps installing a few more trees in the back yard (if we are allowed; we’re currently working our way through a conservation easement on the back end of our property where we want to plant trees that nobody from the town seems to know why is still in effect or if it even serves a purpose anymore, but cannot modify or remove without jumping through a bunch of hoops), and adding a number of statement planters to the rock garden surrounding the house where the flowering perennial plants we pick out will live. In sticking with the green and purple plant scheme, a color combination that I really like, our plants will primarily be clumps of lavender and maybe a few flowering purple sage, some purple tulips in the spring, and a few whiskey barrel planters filled with herbs, purple blossoming chives, and cherry tomatoes…in addition to my rhubarb, of course. Visually appealing, but cohesive and relatively low maintenance, is our goal.
The road to this re-design has been a process not for the faint of heart and definitely not recommended for those who lack motivation or willpower, dislike hours upon hours upon hours of research, visiting with town frequently to try to obtain permits on a yard full of utility, conservation, and drainage easements, crafting designs and re-designs to get a look we love but that still fits into our budget, or going back to the drawing board a dozen times for all of the above reasons. Finding a tree to plant in our front yard was, also, a deceptively difficult, long, and arduous process. I’m not a tree expert (though I may as well be now), but discovering and choosing a tree with some of the beautiful and unique features we prize and really wanted in a statement tree (like peeling, ornamental bark or something along those lines that set it apart and make it special) that also meets a million other criteria (including but not limited to low maintenance, soil adaptive, extremely cold hardy, wind tolerant, generally resistant to pests and disease, non-invasive roots, not too big or too small for the space we have available for it, somewhat speedy grower, multi-season color, not messy, not prone to incessantly reproducing hundreds more of itself in our or our neighbors yards, attracts wildlife like birds but not a million pests or rodents, etc.) has been a journey.
I have learned a lot in the past few months about grass, trees, landscape design, drainage, plants, hardscape, proper foundational preparations, and maintenance…and I have been given multiple opportunities to work on my patience, ability to persevere in the face of multiple failings, and compromise. But we’ve landed on something we think we’ll love, and now a new journey begins – one of even more patience and perseverance as we install phase 1, adjust to a new look, nurse and nurture our new grass to life, and wait to recoup enough time and money to start phase 2.
Ultimately, from this period of being home nearly all the time and spending more of our days and nights noticing the natural world around us, we’ve realized that a relaxing, beautiful, and less work-more enjoyment approach to maintenance in an outdoor area where we can enjoy the unique wonder of each season is important to us. It takes a lot to get there, but like so many things in life, we hope our efforts will be rewarded and we are looking forward to seeing what comes!
