WARNING................... LOTS OF PICTURES

Hey Girls............ I am finally back for good........ I have promised some pictures of what I have been up too since April, so here goes............... Lots of pictures ..................Click on any picture to take a closer look!

This is the front corner of the front of the house and my sweet DH built this lattice on the end of the house to shade the hydrangea's. The house faces west and in the mid afternoon those poor hydrangeas! So we have planted a climbing Don Juan rose right in front of the lattice..... It should be so pretty when it gets to growing..... Right in front of the rose is a clump of asters! I love asters and have them planted everywhere........ I will take more pictures this fall and let you see how things have grown.

This is the front of my shed which also faces west. I have asters planted there along with some dwarf yellow cannas that my brother Paul brought me a couple of weeks ago.. they are the beautiful yellow colored ones. I am not a fan of the dark red ones so he brought me a BUNCH of them. They will get plenty of sunshine but lots of shade for those hot July and August days. There is a beautiful wild rose growing up the lattice. It just finished blooming and will bloom again in a few weeks.

This is underneath the potting shed with all my stuff...... The rack is an old spice rack that I found many years ago in a yard sale. It is perfect for the garden tools and hammer and things that I need for this and that. There are lots of little things that you cannot see. But It is nice and tidy...........

Here is a picture of the potting soil that I have at the end of the potting bench. I took an old table from a yard sale and then took an old wheel barrel off it's wheels and put the bucket of the wheel barrow on top of the table and use it for my potting mixture. It is soooooooooooooooo handy! I have a rack at the end of the shed for all the shovels and rakes and stuff! It keeps things in some sort of order. I love it!

This is just a wide view of the shed for you to see all the things. If you look under the table you will see the good wheel barrow and in the blue tote is the poison stuff that we use to kill the poison ivy and other insecticides for ticks and fleas.

This is the front of the shed with the dwarf yellow cannas and the stuff on the side of the shed. The chair is an old ice-cream parlor chair. I have taken the seat out of it and put a hanging basket in the seat and filled it with good soil and planted some of the ground cover that I use everywhere.. It is my stash pot! hahahhaha..

I have used a lot of my stash this past week so the chair looks a bit sparse, but that stuff grows like weeds........ I just love it but have no idea what it is.........

Now we are on the outside of the fence that goes into the pool that my sweet DH just built. Most of you know that we put in a pool last fall and we got away with part of the yard fenced in last year but had to finish it this spring before the cover came off the pool. So since April we have finished the fence.

This is the fence between us and Mom and Dad on the North side of our house. He did a beautiful job don't you think?

We have some beautiful hydrangeas on the north side and we decided that we would move the bird bath to sit under the faucet where we leave it slow dripping for all our birds. They just love it, especially when the temperatures climb into the 90's.

Here is a better view of the North side. We put an A/C in the window every spring to cool my shop. I hope one of these days to have the A/C from the house run through the attic into my shop. Maybe next year.

Now , this is the Northwest corner of the fence on the front of the house. I found this old wrought iron chair sitting at a garage sale and had to have it. IT weighs a ton! I cannot move it one inch so my sweet DH is so patient with me moving it around until I finally found a home for it. It has an old iron pot with Texas sage and moss rose just waiting to greet anyone that heads toward the gate going into the pool.

DO you remember the lattice panel? I needed your opinion as to where to put it! Well out front by the mail box won the contest and here is the finished product. Oh I still have to paint it but for now it is enjoying the summer sun! It sits right out on the west side of the house in the hot sun. So I put yellow iris and yellow Lantana. Planted around the bottom is some moss rose that will be needed to replant each year. It does not look like much now but I will take pictures as things grow.

This is the back side facing the house. It also has yellow iris and blue morning glories coming up everywhere. I also planted some moss rose around the outside edge of the blocks. I think it will be sooooooooo pretty when things get to going! What you say!

Last year when we decided to put in the pool, I had to move all my iris to another spot and if they were just any old iris I would not have minded but these are iris from Grandma house from many years ago and then there are iris from Mom's house in the country that they left 7 years ago. I would have been distraught if they had not come back. BUT here they are! There is a small hydrangea hid away on the left side of the iris and one day it will be beautiful! It loves being back there in the shade. There is a pretty bird bath hid away back there and next weekend we will put an old pole with a bird feeder atop! Got to keep those precious birds fed and fresh water.

Hanging on the fence in the back yard is an old pot with some more of my stash! That stuff grows so fast so I can have plenty when I need it, and it looks good hanging there!

Now ladies, I do not throw anything away. This is an old bird feeder that we have retired! I took the plastic tube out and found an old wicker basket and cut it in half and shoved it down to the bottom of this wire hanger and filled it with dirt and you guessed it, I put some of my ground cover stash in there and it will climb up and out of that wire basket and it will grow down and look sooooooooo good! Is that too cute or what!

Now this is an old carpenter bucket they say. I guess they used it to carry nails and other things for their trade. I just love this wooden bucket so it is hanging on my new fence. It is filled with Vinca vine and I am thinking that it does not like the hot hot sun and I will need to put it more in the shade in July and August.

This is a Plumbago sitting in the corner of the back yard. It is hardy and it will grow about 5-6 foot tall and has these beautiful blue flowers.

Now this is my FAVORITE!!!! This is an old iron cooker that my brother PE built many years ago. He gave it to me over 19 years ago or so. It has survived a divorce and has been moved from three different houses. I thought that I had lost it 15 years ago but my son Chris came to the rescue and retrieved it from the back field of a house that I had sold. Whew! I always looked at it and thought how wonderful it would be to have it sitting in a corner of a back yard ! Well it has finally found it's home and it looks GREAT !
My DH poured one of those concrete forms with quikrete and then sat it on the concrete. I planted monkey grass around the outside of the concrete. Inside is many different plants and in the blue pot on the right side of the cooker is YES you got it some more of my stash! AND below on the shelf is an old bread rack and it is filled with coconut husk and dirt and YES some of my stash !

I think that this has found a home!

I have a concrete red bird sitting oh so patient on the side of the cooker. He wants to be painted bright red. I will get to him soon...

Is that not just a picture perfect picture! It is sitting in the back yard right up against the new fence! Oh so pretty!

Now sitting here in the back yard on the south side of the back yard is an old black wrought iron bench that I have had for years and years and just had no idea where it would finally live.
Once again my DH poured me a form concrete patch and sat that perfect bench on top! Is that sweet or what! Sitting right next to it on the left is my new adventure of Hollyhocks! I have never grown them so have no idea how they will do! I hope they grow tall and beautiful and grace my back yard with beauty! Now take a look sitting on the bench. It is an old rusty pot filled with some moss rose and a type of small sunflower plant. Sitting next to it is an old bird feeder with the plastic insert taken out and coconut husk with dirt placed inside and you got IT, I have filled it with some of my ground cover statch! Is that too cute or what! Instead of hanging it, I have laid it down! Sweet!

Now, look under the bench, I have put some of that ground cover in the cracks of the concrete and I want it to take over under that bench! Is that going to be so cute or what! I am so having a great time in my back yard!

Now this little planter has a story. The red part that the little planter sits on is the bottom part of an old bird bath. It broke several years ago and I just could not bring myself to throw it away. So under the shed it went and after the fence was finished and I was wandering around looking to decorate the yard when I remember the broken base. I quickly retrieved it and called my sweet DH to the back of the yard and asked him sweetly to mix me up a bit of Quikrete, dig a hole and put that base upside down with its bottom showing ! He did as I asked not knowing what I was up to, the next day when the concrete has set I quickly filled my little concrete dish with dirt and some moss rose and sat it on top of that broken base! There is always something you can do with just the stuff you have laying around!

NOW, this was just a pile of rocks that they pulled out of the ground when digging the pool. Until my DH put the fence up it was just a pile of rocks. THEN after the fence it became a blank canvas for me to paint a picture. This is what I did. There are hostas tucked in and about the rocks and ground cover that I call "snow on the mountain" planted here and there and it will take over in the shade. I have planted a hydreangea over on the other side in the deep shade and at the end of the rocks I have planted more of the dwarf Canna's. Sitting up on top of the large rock is the top of the bird bath that was broken years ago and it is perfect for growing ------- YEAP the perfect ground cover that will grow down that rock onto the ground before the end of summer. It has already left the bowl and drooping over the edge.

Here you see the other side with the old tub with hen and chicks growing in the shade. A new hosta coming along. There is an old white pot sitting high a top of the rocks with my air plane plant enjoying the summer in the shade. I still have a lot of work to do with grass seed and doing some raking but it is coming along.


This is from the far right of the back yard facing toward Mom and Dad's house and the rocks that I just shared with you. We have a lot of wonderful shade in the back yard and the fence has really gave us a sense of a "back yard." On the other side of that fence is 10 acres of woods and looking out over it from the back porch just gave us the sense that we needed to be doing something instead of enjoying the day! The fence hides all the woods while still giving us the wonderful sense of being in the country.

This is the fence along side the south side of the yard and I love how he took the privacy fence to the south down to a shorter fence across the back so as not to hide our beautiful scenery.

This is from the pile of rocks back toward the south. I have planted a lot of hostas along the base of the fence. They should love it there. Wal-Mart had them on sale for & 3.00 a pot and that is cheap! So we bought a lot of them and spaced them out so that we could put different ones inbetween them now and then. I am anxious to see it next year. It should be oh so pretty!

Another picture of the rocks and my other cute little pot sitting in the shade enjoying it's summer vacation. ( I love old watering pots!)

Now this is the little house where Mom and Dad live. This is looking straight at it from the west. They have wonderful shade in the afternoon.

This is looking out from their deck through the grove of trees. Oh so pretty and full of many different birds.

I planted Mom a new rose this spring. A climbing Don Juan . We put up this lattice so that when Don Juan wants to run he will have a place to go.... I love thier porch. See the little wooden sign that says Walshes! It is so homey!

This is our well pumb so I have it enclosed in these decor blocks and I filled a plastic pot with moss rose and sat it on top. It sits right at the bottom of the ramp from Mom's house. She can enjoy the flowers all summer.

Here is the ramp going up on the porch. All the landscaping that we did last summer if finally looking so pretty.

I hung Mom 4 flower baskets along her porch. We planted all sort of things in each one and she is really enjoying going out and tending to her flowers. She is so funny. If it has a bloom she cuts it off and puts it in a coffee cup in the house. I am keeping busy buying Zinnas for her to cut! BUT it makes her happy, and that is what counts!

Isn't that just the cutiest little home. I am so glad that they are spending their last years out here with me. I am blessed to be able to care for them.

I told you that there were a LOT of pictures!!!!!

Hope you enjoyed your garden and yard tour. Now you know what I have been doing since April. WHEW! Now starts the deck around the pool. I will take pictures !

Now! I am coming to your house and do some reading to find out what YOU have been up to!