gardening

The following is a true confession from the daughter of a gardener, who has an impeccable yard and landscaping, as well as a world-class vegetable/herb garden. Also, my mother-in-law is equally passionate about gardening. She has a prize-winning day lily garden and is an upstanding member of her garden club for which she had to audition. I’m not a gardener and am loathe to doing any yard work. I would rather read a book or cook or knit. It’s not surprising then that our yard looks like hell.

Our house is nestled between a professionally manicured lawn and the yard of a horticulturalist, both of whom perpetually put us to shame, though more so the horticulturalist as she and her husband work on their yard for hours every weekend. While I concede that, with children, we don’t have that kind of time to dedicate to landscaping, we also can’t manage to mow our yard and pull weeds, some of which now have trunks as thick as young trees. (Hangs head in shame.)

I make no promises of creating something grand, but this is the summer I’m going to get in touch with my inner green thing. For the past few summers I have grown herbs and tomatoes in containers, and this summer is no different. Already, using starter plants rather than seeds, I have planted basil, thyme, rosemary, sage, and oregano. I should be able to start using the herbs in the next few weeks. But in a more ambitious move, I pulled weeds from the beds in the patio area. The beds currently have hostas and sedum, which are now augmented by the deep red coral bells (heuchera) and sedum that I planted recently.

Now we do rain dances and hope the plants “take.” But, I’m also actively scheming the next addition of foliage! This gardening/landscaping thing is fun.

Note: the irises came with the house.