Day 239 - One Bit at a Time

This was a little gardening project of mine and Henry's late this afternoon. As I hung out the washing, I realised that the little corner in the garden was looking pretty sad and weedy. We had pulled out a dead bush, a few weeks prior and now only weeds were left. So we pulled it all out, transplanted some agapanthus and filled up the bed with pine chip.

Henry enjoyed watering it with the hose. Then he enjoyed watering his trackies. And then his shoes. Finally watering time was over.

Now we just have a few corner makeovers left!

Day 191 - A Wet Day in the Garden

I have to admit that I took my photo in the garden the next day. After such a long, wet, soggy day outdoors, taking photos was the last thing on my mind. By the time we were done, all I wanted was to get inside a hot shower! First thing this morning we got onto hiring a chipper / mulcher, was was more difficult than I expected. Anyway after tracking one down which was just out of town, we got home, started it up and then the first rain drops fell. They didn't stop all day. Unfortunately when you have hired equipment, you just have to keep going if you don't want to waste your money, so on we went. We swept and mulched up all the gum leaves (blower vac didn't work in the wet weather!), mulched up all the twigs, branches and tree offcuts that would fit, pulled out two non living plants and generally tidied. It didn't look like we had done a lot until pretty late in the day and even Dale admitted it was worth doing. So that's one more thing crossed off my holiday list!

Day 101 - My Own Gardening Assistant at Last!

Dale didn't need a whole lot of convincing to take today as annual leave, his only problem was that the day was intended for doing gardening. As day care was available to us, Henry left us to our own devices for the day as we finished off getting our front yard into order. Last holidays I laid down pine mulch in half of the front garden and it has worked really well as weed control. So today we did the front half which is the most visible to the street. We got through 3 cubic metres of the mulch which surprised us, all laid down on about 50 copies of the Sydney Morning Herald. And Dale hardly complained at all... well maybe just a little...

Day 61 - We Grew These!

After dinner tonight when the rain subsided slightly, I went outside to the apple trees. We had noticed during dinner that the downpour of the day must have caused all of the apples to fall off the tree. Many of them were a bit soft and had been attacked by parrots, but I gathered up the ones that seemed decent. I hope to make an apple chutney or sauce on the weekend and somehow use them. Although we didn't do anything to assist with the growing, I still find it great that we grew them!

Day 23 - Mini Makeover!

Our garden has multiple little separate spaces and this is one in the backyard that I made over today. After a longer than realised catch up with Sarah in the morning (whose backyard I admired) I came home and had a very quick lunch before getting stuck in. I had been talking to Elva who does all of our garden areas at school, earlier in the week and asked her for her advice on keeping the weeds away (I seem to spend hours on it each holidays). She gave me about 100 copies of the Sydney Morning Herald to put under the bark chip and voila!

Day 16 - Another Day in the Garden

So I spent last Monday in the front yard and today was the day to try and get the back yard started on. It isn't quite finished, but I did fill the trailer yet again for another trip to the tip. No creepy crawlies this time,  thankfully and so it was a majority of the day spend hacking, trimming, sweeping, raking and mowing. By the afternoon it was getting a bit windy, so the blower vac will probably finish the job tomorrow. Only thing is that I need to attack the big pile of 'stuff' up the back from the last garden clean up that didn't quite make it to the tip!

Day 11 - Tricky Trailer

So this morning, Jenna and I decided to brave the tip. I also had to brave driving with a trailer on the car, with the possibility of having to reverse (something I have never done before). We managed our two trips pretty well, despite all the wind and dust that was about, and got rid of all of the green waste from the front yard makeover on Monday. Getting the trailer off the tow bar was the only real challenge, as I somehow missed that part of the quick tutorial Dale gave me before he left for work. Seemed so obvious once I called him and asked what the trick was! On a day where I was aiming to be on time to a lunch outing, I was grateful, for being patiently waited for!

Day 9 - Just How I Wanted It... Part 2

Well the big compliment was that Dale said this picture didn't do it justice. On Saturday I started a bit of trimming out the front. Dale finished it off by cutting the tops off the way too high bottle brush trees in front of the windows which were actually touching the roof! Today another 4 hours and 2 trailer loads of clippings later, it is pretty much finished. You can see the gravel paths again, I weeded the lot and sawed off all the suckers from the base of the tree out front, that had gotten very bushy.

This time I was so careful near where I have now been bitten twice by bull dog ants, but I was shocked to see a bit fat spider poking up out of a little burrow which could possibly be a brown trap door spider. I have to say that all these creepy crawlies in the front yard are really beginning to make my skin crawl!

Day 7 - Puppy!

While we were outside getting a start on the front yard today in the effort to tackle one area of the house at a time, Henry thoroughly amused himself by having a chat with Milly through the gap in the gate. In her excitement, Milly returned the attention by providing plenty of licks and snuffling! One of Henry's latest words is 'puppy' and he even says Moo Moo, which is Milly's nickname around here! You can see in the photo that Henry did squeal with laughter a couple of times!

At the same time, Dale massacred the bottle brush trees obscuring our windows and we made the decision to pull a couple of plants that were messy looking, cleaning up the areas around the garden tap. While we worked, I reminded Dale of the time he came over and 'cut back' my beautiful bougainvillaea... yes it was starting to touch the roof, but perhaps that did not require it to be cut to within an inch of its life. It was also hardly a vine anymore, standing at about 20cm tall!

I hope to post a photo of the front yard sometime next week, after I have cleared up all the clippings and taken them to the green waste recycling place. I also hope to do it without getting another bull dog ant bite. If you remember the post on my blog from last year they are most likely to result in you screaming and hopping about in your street and I got another bite today!