For the past 6 years, bar last year when I was in Japan, I have wanted to garden. And I don't mean vegetable gardening, my parents already do that every year with mixed results. And I have helped them to plant and water it, but there is just something unsatisfiying about it. Yes you work hard and get to eat the fruit of your labor but it doesn't seem to feed the soul you know? So I began yearning for my own 'little bit of earth' and felt this overwhelming need to plant some flowers, some bushes, and create a beautiful spot for myself and others to enjoy.
Of course this has never been possible before, I live with my parents still, as they are helping me on the way through college and my father is the-man-who-would-mow. He doesn't like to mow, as we have 5 acres of land and it is a big full day job when he does decide to do it, but when he does he wants to be able to just mow, and thus I have never been able to plant anything that could not be picked up and moved out of the way of the mower. He hates to weedwack you see.
So in the meantime I have been a 'container gardener' and every late May or very early June I spend a weekend planting flowers that can withstand lots and lots of sun into several pots and windowbox style containers. To date I have two white windowbox style planters that sit on the patio, two very large pots (sorry they were a gift so I don't know the diameter) that sit on either side of the steps leading up to the deck, and one lone stone pedestal urn that was here when we moved in. And every year I struggle to find sun loving plants that can stand the extreme July heat here in Michigan.
Typically marigolds go into the stone urn, usually from seedlings from the local Meijer's but this last year I had great results from seeds I planted there so that's my new go-to as it is much cheaper. And somehow more satisfying to see things growing from scratch for you. In the large pots I have only had them two years, the first year it rained almost non stop for a month and my hostsa's died a drippy death in them. The following summer I cut holes with a boxcutter into the bottom of them since they were now without half their dirt (to heavy to lift when full of dirt!) and planted geraniums, some ornamental grass, and some ivy. They did well until July when they struggled a bit with all the water evaporation and I struggled a bit to be home every day from work to water them. The windowbox style are always the hardest to fill, mostly because they are long, skinny, and not terribly deep. Because of this they dry out faster than the pots or the urn (which was under a tree, now dead from a lightening storm) and I have a harder time keeping the plants in them alive. The first year I planted some silver leaved plants which I cannot remember the name of, and some other plants that were meant for partial shade and were stunted or died in the hot sun. The following year I discovered sundials (it goes by several names) which gave a profusion of small flowers all summer, and if deadheaded will continue to bloom in many colors and varigated designs. I also fill with snapdragons, marigolds, and whatever else strikes me at the garden center.
All of this is nice, and I do enjoy seeing them flowering through the warmer months but I yearn for something more. Something that can involve larger plants, sweeping vistas, and perhaps a birdbath. So I yearned for a garden. A real one. And this past fall I decided I would have one, come hell or high water. The impetus was my computer OS crashed and burned and was thus unavailable to me for two weeks. I was bored, more so than I have been in many a year, and all the gardening books that I have picked up over the past few years at bargain book sales, yard sales, and used book stores suddenly beconned, and begged me to read them. So I did. And I rediscovered my desire for having a plot of my own. So having argued with my parents over it's location I was finally given my 'bit of earth' on the side of the house between the house and the fence, so long as I didn't plant anything in front of the egress windows (60 year old house).
Now that it is almost January I can begin planning for my garden, and thanks to the oddly warm weather we have been having the past week all of our foot and a half of snow has melted and I could wander outside with a tape measure to figure out the amount of space I had to work with. The garden size shall be no larger than 32'8" by 16' 6". Which to me, a beginner in the field of REAL gardening, seems to be quite large and daunting. I know basically what I WANT the shape of the garden to be, but not really what I want to plant in it, or where I want those plants to go. I do know that I want some pavers run through the middle of it as a walkway, and I want a birdbath: a simple one, no small children looking at a book or anything like that, and some sort of paver-retaining wall stacked maybe 6"-12" high as a wall around it, to protect it from the lawnmower. But other than that, I don't know what I want to do, and the task of starting a garden from scratch seems so difficult.
To cheer myself I have purchased a miniature rose bush, the cheap kind from the grocery store, and have placed it on top of the book shelf (2 shelves) with my other houseplants to ride out the winter. I've heard lots of people do that, and instead of throwing them away when the blooms die they keep them and plant them out in their gardens when it gets nice enough outside. Hopefully I can keep this one alive and do the same. Only supposed to get up to 1' x 1' but we'll see I guess. So wish me luck! And here are some pictures of my houseplants if you'd like to see them. I'm a bit hit or miss with them able to keep some alive but not others, and currently fighting with my polka-dot plant and it's legginess. :)
