Front yard meadow: 100% suckah free

For those of you sitting around biding your time until you could be, like, See Finny, I told you that meadow was going to look like crap, I guess you'll just have to sit around some more.

Though, from the looks of you, that's about all you're fit to do anyway.

Oh my god! So mean! I know. It happens. When people make fun of my garden, I fight dirty.

Good news for all you other people who don't suck: the meadow is alive and believes spring is coming!

Last frost date was March 1st, so it's been spring for a while, bitches.

Silly meadow. It's been raining for two solid weeks. And, there have been tornadoes nearby.

When you weren't looking, the first day of Spring came and went. We were here, where were you?

Oh. So, OK. Apparently this meadow, what with its xeric-ness and low maintenancenessocity, has something of an attitude.

I guess I would, too, though if I could do all this with nothing more than annual rainfall and a few minutes of weed pulling from time to time.

Do not cross me - the Great and Powerful Garden of Oz. Or something like that.

Funny thing about this crazy ass meadow of mine is that the former fescue lawn, which was dug up, flipped over, covered in landscape fabric and mulch and then planted with 280 grass plugs, 800+ wildflower bulbs and a multitude of wildflower seeds has really begun to flourish.

Like it's saying to us, Hey people, this is what I wanted all along when you two idiots where out here mowing me and fertilizing me and aerating me (what the hell was that anyway?). All along I just wanted to be flipped over, ignored and abused.

Fescue is so weird. And also a little bit sado? Strange.

That tall dark green spikiness? Fescue.

But - the shit is growing like nuts now and, to me, it's very cool. It grows in those lovely tall dark green clumps you see there and then it goes to seed with these tall fancy seed head wands that look ever so lovely intermixed with the native grass plugs, flowers and bulbs.

Unless you're Bubba.

If you're Bubba, you want to mow it down. You want to trim and tidy it because Fescue is Lawn. You want your wife to go out there with pruning shears and tame that shit. You want tornadoes to stop following you to California as though they can still smell the Kansas on you.

It's a hard time for Bubba.

Fortunately, he's let me be about the fescue's crazy growth. He's too distracted by our new tree's growth instead.

Take it from me, there's growth. Next time maybe I take a picture that shows that.

And, frankly, I doubt he ever thought we'd get to the stage we are in now with Wife's Funny Front Yard Meadow Idea, so he's probably operating mostly out of relief that no one has called the neighborhood blight committee on our asses.

See. That's progress. Toward something.

Yeah, because compared to last year at this time, we were looking a bit sparse in the Front Yard department. At least now it looks like we're trying *something* even if it's not *something* people are used to seeing. Specifically, a random ass meadow in the middle of the suburbs.

Though, to the credit of my neighbors, I've had more compliments than concerns about the state of our yard and, so far, no one has come by asking me to clear up the eyesore of our overgrown lawn.

Who would have the heart to mow down snowdrops anyway? Only monsters. And communists.

And if, by some wild hair inserted into your bum, you want to get rid of your lawn and put in a xeric meadow, I have just the article for you. Or, you could read through the long winded version on the blog here where you get extra swears and side stories at no extra charge.

Step 1: Flip the lawn over
Step 2: Plant one million grass plugs
Step 3: Plant one million wildflower bulbs
Step 4: Fill in the blanks
Step 5: Hunt down neighborhood jackasses that let their dogs poo in the meadow

I'm such a giver.

Life With Meadow. (Not a tampon ad)

For those of you who've been riding the roller coaster known as My Front Yard Meadow, you may have noticed that this not an approach for the anal retentive, tidy-minded, control freaks of the world.

Who needs tidy when there's POPPIES.

 Not that I want to scare anyone off of turning their lawns over to create their own personal near-xeric WILD ASS meadow in their yards, but I am still getting used to Life With Meadow and thought I'd drag you all along for the ride today.

 I'm the nicest.

Life With Meadow - sounds like a lame TV show that might be on Lifetime. I assure you, this is not that.

See - there are the upsides to the concept:

• You can get rid of your water sucking lawn and it's water shooting sprinkler system
• You can roll your mower into the street for the garbage truck to play with
• You can go through intensive physical therapy to regain full use of your rotator cuff and then never use the muther effing asshole string trimmer again
• You get to inhale all the oohs and aahs from your neighbors as they admire the many colors of poppies sproinging loose from your yard all over the damn sidewalk
• You get to watch hummingbirds, butterflies, honey and bumble bees, lizards and finches all return to your yard to play, eat, kill one another and fornicate now that it's no longer a wasteland of useless lawn out there
• It's pretty

This is the former pee-hole. I think you will agree that it has improved somewhat.

But then there are also the downsides, which, now after more than a full year's seasonal changes under my belt, I'm just starting to get a handle on:

• In some seasons the yard just looks like shit
• There's some maintenance involved in ripping crap out once it's gone to seed (poppies - I love you but WOW do you get ugly when you're done)
• You find trash that's flown into the yard and gotten stuck and then you have to pick it out and throw it away
• Some neighbors think you're totally a nutter

Now, I can still count and that still looks like more pros than cons for the Front Yard Meadow concept, but I thought I'd be remiss if I didn't bring it all out into the open for you fine people so that no one went wandering off into the sod cutter rental yard thinking that yard dominance was at hand with just a few quick swipes of the yard.

That is not so and I'd be doing you a disservice to lead you to believe that it was, indeed, so.

Instead I will tell you that I'm pretty SUPER glad that we're past the It Looks Like Shit Right Now But Wait Until Spring When It Looks Really Pretty time of year (AKA Fall and Winter) and getting into the Yes It's Beautiful Now So Please Remember This Come Winter When It Looks Like Shit Again time of year (AKA Spring and Summer).

 Another thing about this whole meadow concept is that it's not a one shot deal. You can't just (or, I guess *I* can't just) plant it once and forget about it, leaving it to do its xeric beautifying of the neighborhood without any additional intervention.

No. It needs help.

Help in the sense of pulling shit out that randomly grows (weeds, overturned lawn with a new found lease on life, the nefarious offspring of one slutty Guara...), pruning crap back that gets wildly out of hand (Guara, aforementioned suddenly virile lawn) and planting new stuff in the spots that become bare from the pulling out of shit I don't want.

It's a process, you might say. It's a "labor of love", some might say even though that trite bullshit saying makes me want to jam spoons into my ears and those of the person saying it.

I'm going with - it's a process. And I'm getting used to it. Life With Meadow means I'm not done yet and I probably won't ever be *done* and that's actually OK because I like this messy, weird, unpredictable space way better than the neat, tidy and predictably needs to be mowed every five goddamned minutes in between intensive waterings lawn that lived here before.

So, there's your Front Yard Meadow update. I'll be sure to post some photos after the whip and chair taming action I'm going to lay down on this beast this weekend whilst handing out tomato plants.

Next step in sucking less

Although, according to the dog, we definitely suck MORE.

When last we saw my front yard, it was looking like I'd taken to planting sod while drinking my 13th cocktail because WHOOPSY the lawn had been flipped over.

Thankfully, I meant to do that. And, thankfully, I rarely drink 13 cocktails in one sitting because - yarf.

The next thing to do, once the grass plugs showed up, was to tarp, mulch and plant the yard with the new less water sucking meadow grass and wildflowers.

And while that may all fit nice and neatly into one little sentence there, the process was nothing quite so little. Or nice. Especially when you consider how fucking hot it was in NorCal this past weekend. And if you consider that I first ran six miles (yay! Short taper distance!) and afterward I had a bachelorette party (not mine obviously) waiting for me.

I knew the exhaustion was going to be extreme. Which is why I was sort of hoping that High Country Gardens, the folks from whom I purchased my 210 (!) grass plugs, would have lame shipping practices that would result in the plugs not showing up until Monday. So that I could spend Saturday preparing for a night of binge drinking by methodically lining my stomach with mashed potatoes, dinner rolls or something equally absorbent.

But no. They're reliable over there at HCG, and when you say, "I want my stuff to ship on 9/21." It arrives the Friday of that week, just in time to be planted on the weekend and before it can totally die in the box because you're too busy working or taking the dog to the beach to do serious work like planting a meadow in your front yard like you would be if it showed up on the Monday you were secretly hoping for.

You understand - I'm lazy and I procrastinate. I was hoping their shipping methods would support these character flaws of mine. But they did not. Which, in hind sight, is a good thing since this time it would have meant a big box of dead grass and a bunch of money down the toi.

Anyway. Enough about my laziness.

Inspired by Knittah's recent comments, I'm going to press on in a sort of How To-sy way. And I'll try to add helpful nuggets in there as we go, but if I miss something, leave a comment and I'll try to answer your question if I know the answer. Which I might not.

And on that note, of not knowing everything (shhh! don't tell!), I also don't know everything about planting a xeric meadow, even though this series of posts may lead you to believe that I do, what with the numbered lists and all, but let me make it clear that I've never done this before and don't know if it'll take so just know that I'm not saying this is The Way to do this, but rather just the way *I* am doing this, so follow my How-To at your own risk. Personally, I'm optimistic about the results.

Anyway!

To introduce some sort of meaning to my How-To, you'll recall that steps 1 (cut up the sod) and 2 (flip it over) were covered in a previous post in which Bubba was nearly swallowed whole by a sod cutter.

For Step 3, then: Tarp the yard

I'd say "weedblock" or "Weedblock" or "landscape fabric" or whatever, other than "tarp", here, but the fact is that you can use most tarp-like materials to perform the function of blocking out weeds and you don't need me telling you which brand or type of material to use. Also, I'm not a shill for these products and merchants I mention and I don't want you thinking I am and then being all pissed when your "Weedblock" gets a tear just because you stepped on it when it was stretched tight and now you have to cover that hole with more tear-happy "Weedblock".

Not that this has necessarily happened to me. One hundred times.

Anyway - the point here is that once you've cut the sod and turned it over so that the decomposing grass can provide a nice compost for your new plugs, you should still tarp it to keep other weeds from invading your meadow and choking out your precious meadow grass plugs. Because I hear that this can happen. And I don't want any part of it.

Also know that when I say, "you", I mean "me", but it always comes out that way.

Step 4: Get some mulch and then go for a run while Bubba unloads it onto the tarp.

This came from Mountain View Garden Center and is just thin gorilla hair mulch.

Technically, you can be a good wife and unload it from the back of the truck because he was so nice to go pick it up during the week, which involved him shoveling it into the bed of the truck while wearing his nice work clothes and shoes, but you don't have to is what I'm saying.

You can just go for your run and then come home and rake it out, making sure that he makes note of how you just ran six miles and are totally awesome for immediately putting on your work clothes and getting down to business.

And, I will say this about Bubba, he's always the first to give me credit for doing anything remotely helpful. In fact, sometimes I think he may give me *too* much credit, but let's not go spreading that around.

Step 5: Water the mulch

We've capped the sprinklers, so are using this hose stand sprinkler thingee in the mean time. It's fine.

Now, this step, and the future ones where I tell you to water things, may seem counter-intuitive to the whole "suck less water" idea, but to get these guys established, I'm told that they will need to be watered at the outset. For root establishment and what not, so just do it and then hope to hell that they do establish and grow because if they don't we'll all look a little stupid for ignoring blatant instructions.

For now though, just water the mulch. This will help it mat together and be less fluffy so that when you go to plant, you don't have to wade through quite as much mulch to get down to the tarp and dirt. Plus, less will end up in your nose and I know you'll appreciate this as much as I do.

I do not enjoy mulch splinters in my nostrils.

Step 6: Distribute the grass plugs

Go ahead and say they're "SO CUTE!" because everyone else did.

Now, if this were, say, six years ago and I was still in that phase of my life where I didn't think two minutes ahead into the future, I would have just sat down at one corner of the yard with the box of plugs and started planting away. And not until I'd gotten, say, 3/4 of the yard planted would I realize that WHOOPSY I'd been planting the plugs too close together and SHITSHITSHIT had run out of plugs altogether.

Then there'd be some pretty elaborate swearing and either some mad cap unplanting and replanting or a race to the internet to order more plugs.

Thankfully, this is not six years ago and instead of engaging in that back-in-the-day-of-Finny madness I instead thought five minutes into the future (see mom, I AM growing up) and took one flat of plugs at a time (each flat has 70 plugs) and started dropping them at random but evenly dispersed intervals beginning at the far corner.

And don't you just know that the side of the yard at which I started was much more densely populated with tiny grassy plugs than the side of the yard at which I finished. And then all I had to do was grab a few from one side and toss them over to the other side in a way that was still random but less congested so we wouldn't have any unseemly bald spots in the event that the grass actually grew in right.

WOO! I learned from past mistakes! I'm growing as a person!

Step 7: Make dip

Not Hidden Valley, but still good.

Don't be ashamed if, at this point, you'd rather go inside and make some ranch dip and sit on the porch eating it with a big bag of potato chips, because I was right there with you. All this prep work is monotonous and, with all your neighbors standing around watching you organize fluffy grass poofs in your front yard, one can get a little self-conscious and feel like retreating into a big bowl of Leave Me Alone With My Craziness, but stay with me.

This dip is for the plugs. I hear it helps keep the plugs from drying out when you plant them and helps them establish sooner so that you don't have to wait forever and a day for your meadow to prove to your neighbors that you're not a total hippie loon.

This dip is a creepy thing though, let it be known. I added the recommended 1 ounce of dip to the recommended 4-5 gallons of water in my super old ass bucket with the broken handle grip and watched in grotesque amazement as this shit congealed into a spooky mass of dirty Jell-O.

Note that the dirt was already in the bucket and I don't believe it hurt anything.

Step 8: Scratch the plugs

Now, I forgot to take a photo of this process, but let me describe it to you.

See, each plug is like a tiny plant you might buy at the nursery. So when you take it out of the tray, it's got a mat of roots at the base, just like you'd find on your average 4" petunia seedling.

What you want to do here (and thanks to my garden savvy neighbor for reminding us of the crucial importance of this step) is "scratch" or cut the base of this mat off and "scratch" or slice down the sides of the root ball so that you have an open frayed end on your seedling - still holding onto some soil - but not all bound up in there with no hope to grow.

You can do this on all your plugs ahead of time to save a step at planting time, or, if you're like me, you can enlist the help of your Scratch Happy husband to do this while you start planting so that all the plugs are scratched by the time you reach them with your trowel with the intention of dipping and planting them.

We found that a standard box cutter worked really well for this. Just don't try to catch a flight afterward, ifyaknowwhatImean.

Step 9: Commence to planting

With your dip all jiggly and waiting (PORNO GARDENING ALERT), grab your pointiest trowel and get to work, already.

Goes like this:

Dig a hole
UPDATE: punching through the landscape fabric with your pointy trowel and planting the plug in the soil below.

Dip the plug

Plant the plug

Bubba and I did that 210 times in the course of about two hours. It was monotonous and it was blazing hot outside and the neighbors kept coming over with their kids to tell us how we could be doing it better, but in the end it got done and Bubba and I still speak to each other even though I had to make a sudden escape to the backyard when the neighborhood boy began telling me how we should be watering our "lawn" and wouldn't be satisfied with the explanation that this wasn't going to need to be watered for much longer but thanks for your help, buddy, and hey isn't your dad calling you?

I'll say it now, I have no patience for children and I have a really hard time hiding it. I'm sorry you had to learn about it this way.

Step 10: Survey your greatness while watering your new future meadow

Like I said before, there is watering involved in this process even though the desired end result is no watering at all.

So, now that your plugs are tucked into their own individual holes with goopy greatness covering their tender roots, you must water. And water good.

And if you know what song is going through my head right now because of that last statement, I'm glad you and I can be crazy together.

By this time it was mighty hot and I was jealous of the grass playing in the sprinklers.

Anyway, we watered (or, to be honest, Bubba watered while he shooed me off to the shower because he knew I felt nasty and really wanted to shower but was feeling guilty leaving him to water my future meadow) each individual plant and the overall future meadow until it was pretty well soaked and then, in the evening (and each with a cocktail) we did it again.

And then on Sunday, when I was in a hot rage thanks to Brett Favre and his old man football antics (RETIRE ALREADY DAMN YOU), we went out and watered again if only so that Bubba could introduce some comic relief into my life by surreptitiously watering my shoes/feet/legs/hair while pretending to water the future meadow.

He knows when I need a laugh and WOW did I need a laugh at that point. And no drinks because YAY I was hungover from the aforementioned bachelorette party and was nursing a swift little headache.

Freshly watered and ready to grow. Or so I hope.

Step 11: Wait and meanwhile order some bulbs

My plan is to randomly plant some wildflower bulbs in and amongst this meadow grass so that maybe one day it will look something like a mini meadow out there, so while this stuff decides whether it's going to live or die, I ordered a lot of wildflower bulbs.

Because shopping is the best medicine when you're worried that your big gardening bet isn't going to pay off and you might have just made a very public ass of yourself, so better to cover it with flowers.

I got some wildflower bulbs and I'm happy to say that I have managed to create a big old project for myself to dread because when these many bags of bulbs arrive I will be out in that yard for many hours getting them all planted.

But that's OK. It will give me time to talk to each seedling and remind them that they should grow big and strong and not make me look like a loser. Even though I will then look like a big freak for talking to my plants.

Take the good with the bad, I guess.

My meadow and poo.

Here's something fun and potentially shocking - I'm not a totally delusional liar!

In the case of meadow grass, anyway.

Yes, friends - the meadow, MY MEADOW, has come in. Just as I imagined/predicted/hoped/shook my fist that it would way back last year when I defied all logic and flipped over my lawn.

No one wanted to mow anymore. I hated watering a stretch of grass that no one but the neighborhood dogs used and which didn't want to grow in the shade of our street trees anyway.

The lawn in the backyard? Well, that's there because OUR dog loves it and rolls in it and has accepted it as her own personal lord and savior (seriously, you should see her roll around on the thing - they are having a love affair. I'll stop now.), so I let it live on. Bubba mows it and I don't have to do anything except enjoy watching the dog roll all around on it and look blissfully happy, so it works for me.

The front yard though? No lawn. I'm not about providing a lush and high maintenance toilet for all these dogs, birds, cats and wildlife that roam our little neighborhood.

I bet you didn't know that the Silicon Valley area had wildlife did you? Well, it does. If you consider possums, squirrels, rats (barf), raccoons, hawks and skunks to be wildlife. Which I do. Because they poop anywhere they want. Though, in that definition, some of our neighbors' dogs could be considered wildlife. And that guy that drags the shopping cart down the middle of the street while he yells at his big spoon.

You know what I mean.

The meadow though - It's totally IN.

Which was the point of this post, anyway.  Whether any wildlife is pooping in it is beyond my knowledge. Which is how I prefer things. Though I can tell you a grody animal poop story later if you're interested. Think about it, I'll come back to it.

For now though - look:

LEGIT.

I'm sorry folks, but that July shot looks a lot like a meadow would look if, say, someone were to drag their porch out into nature and then park their car next to it.

Thankfully, that fountain grass gets mighty tall, so I imagine I'll be able to take this picture again in another month and all signs of cars, gas meters, neighbors' kid's shitty cars and kitchen windows will be completely lost amidst the wild sea of flailing fountain grass.

Goodbye, neighbor's stuff.

Plus, I planted gaura galore from my mom's garden (thanks for the plant babies, ma!) and that shit gets huge and wild, so I should also be able to hide the hose (not shown)(because it's ugly) that's coiled up next to the porch and, HEY, most of the porch itself because whoopsy I planted a lot of gaura and also a Hot Lips salvia by the front step there and, well, both of those plants are low-water monsters.

They live to grow! They live to attract pollinators! They live to tickle your legs when you walk by! They live to invade every space around you with their nefarious seeds! They barely need water and don't care if you step on them in your heels! It's a good time.

All of this has seen the horrors of 4 inch heels and lived to tell the tale.

So, yes, I've planted things in addition to the grass plugs that like to grow big and strong without the assistance of regular watering and also like to reseed with abandon so that every year I don't have to go through the hamstring and back breaking agony that I did last fall right before I ran a half marathon.

Bad planning.

Also fun was when I decided last weekend that I would hand prune our Japanese maple. Yeah. Because that's a good thing for someone without any experience to do when all they have is the vague direction of an creepy arborist with questionable credentials.

"Just prune it the way you want it to look."

"And don't use shears. Just your hands."

"And don't cut the top branch."

Oooooooookaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay.

Does it look normal? You decide. I mean, it's going to look how it looks now, because I have no control over how the thing grows, obviously, but maybe just tell me if you know anything about pruning Japanese maples that's more helpful than, "Just make it look the way you want it to look".

Not helpful. Can you imagine getting directions from this jackass? "Just drive the car to where you want to go."

Thanks, asshole.

Anyway, this post is derailing from its original purpose of telling you guys that the idea to scrape up the lawn, flip it over and plant grass plugs and wildflowers in it in order to create a personal low-water meadow is totally working.

And also Bubba has given me the thumbs up on getting a nice big stone to put out there so that, when it rains, a little water collects and creates a natural water feature for, like, the shitting anywhere birds and such. Fun!

So, for that grody poo story: (You thought about this, yes?)

Once upon a time I was standing on our brand newly minted front porch with Bubba and the contractor, saying our farewells and high-fiving ourselves on a porch that was in no way a result of our own handiwork, when I got a whiff of something FOUL.

Like Poo Foul.

It smelled like poo.

So, I checked my shoes, ever so inconspicuously I assure you, and found nothing. I tried peering under Bubba's shoes and saw nothing. I started to think maybe our awesome contractor had wandered through something Foul but saw no evidence of that either. And then the whiff hit me again.

Definitely poo.

And then, because I was standing on the porch where there was light and the whiff was coming from the yard, where there was no light, I squinted my eyes against the light and followed my nose ever so carefully toward the stench only to find that someone had:

A. Let their dog walk all the way up to our porch, even though it's plenty far from the sidewalk to make this totally inappropriate

B. Then let their dog take a monster dump IN THE MIDDLE OF ONE OF MY PLANTS

and then,

C. Not pick it up at all so that it could sit there and smolder in the warm springtime weather.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, nice.

So, as we were celebrating the conclusion of our porch and the aliveness of our yard, a giant poo wafted in and ruined the moment.

Grody.

But perhaps I will have the last laugh now that the yard has grown in to the point where I can have wildlife hiding out and waiting to pounce on the no-poo-picking-up owner and their giant-poo-pile-making dog.

Do you think I can entice a bobcat to come hide in my yard? They do live around here somewhere.

Half a meadow + everything that's not vegetables.

How about before this turns into a LOOK AT THESE VEGETABLES DOING THINGS blog for the next six months, I show you the first results from last fall's efforts to turn my front yard into a drought tolerant meadow?

OK, let's do that.

But remember, like most things in the gardening world - this is an ongoing process. I'm imagining it will take a few seasons of, "Hey, there's an empty patch, let's put something there." before it gets all filled in and truly meadow-like.

So, I just say that because I don't want any to hear any beef about the bald spots that were supposed to be all covered with bushy meadow grass by now what happened is it dead? Because I don't need that kind of pressure in my life, oh beloved neighbors who I try to imagine are just being constructive and interested.

Sheesh. Go mow your water-sucking lawn and leave me to my bulbs.

Anyway - I'm OK with how my future meadow is progressing so far, and since I know that we won't have to mow ever again, that makes it all the better.

So, obviously, given these photos, the $.99 landscaping I did has proven again to be well worth my time. All 30 seconds of it that I spent dumping out a few packets of wildflower seeds and kicking dirt over them with the toe of my flip-flop.

The sidewalk patch has never looked finer and now I'm starting to wonder if I should have just taken that approach on the entire front yard except that I know how barren it gets around, say, December, and I doubt our neighbors would enjoy the dirt hole of our sidewalk patch extended across our entire front yard.

No, that'd be ugly. And I'd be ashamed. But only if it were the whole front yard. The dog pee hole though? That can go ahead and look shitty for three months out of the year and I won't give much of a crap. I mean, what do I expect from a dollar's worth of seeds? A year round cutting garden of Eden?

No.

I just expect it to look passable for most of the year while I don't water it or do anything other than point to it and go, "HA! 99 cents. That rules." as I go on about my life. Also, sometimes I get excited about the poppies and take photos like those you see above, BUT THAT'S IT.

I don't want more commitment than that with a sidewalk patch that's not "technically" mine in the first place, according to the City of San Jose.

Alright, now that we've paid heed to the front yard's shenanigans, I'll give you a quick run-down of what the backyard is doing to get my attention before all of my eyes are on the vegetables until October.

Much to my relief, the potatoes (top left) are actually sprouting in their old tires, so all that time they spent getting wrinkly and pathetic-looking on my counter wasn't a complete detriment to their ability to grow. Phew. I still have no fucking idea what I'm doing with the potatoes (help - when do I put more soil on them? Now?), but they at least appear to be alive. Yay.

Much to Bubba's relief, the apple tree (moving right through the photos) is making another effort at growing this year - its second year in our yard and its first overwintered spring - and that's good because if the apple tree croaked ohmigawdIdontknowwhatwewoulddo.

Some daffodils are blooming still - which was a surprise because I thought we were done after the white and yellow ones, but SURPRISE, there were some of my favorite variety just waiting to sprout up and get trampled by the dog. For the record, I favor the ones with the orange centers because, well, I like orange. So there's that.

The cherry tree, which I love with the rest of my heart that's not dedicated to loving tomatoes (there's some room left over), is blooming enthusiastically which pleases me greatly and causes my neighbors (who gave us the tree) to warn us about stealthy thieves who've been known to sneak into people's gardens and leave holes where, previously, there were healthy blossoming cherry trees. They're such jokers!

I have installed locks, though. Just to be safe. (Kidding)

On the patio, totally minding its own business since I raped it of all of its lemons a month ago, is the dwarf Meyer lemon just blooming its little heart out. Which is incredible given the horrible shearing I gave it a few years back, from which I thought it would never recover. Yikes. When I think about the pruning that poor tree took...*shudder* Anyway - it has about five hundred blossoms on it right now and PHEW. Plus, it smells rully nice.

Yarrow. It's fuzzy. And the two new plants I put in, like, five minutes ago, are already blooming. And you don't really care so let's just move on.

Strawberries! They're alive! Which is no small miracle since, a few years back, I nearly pulled them from the veg beds before their time to throw them away because I didn't know that strawberries are perennials. Oh. Thank you, mom, for letting me in on that little secret in time to save these very happy plants from certain death. Now they are happily growing in the landscaping, where they won't be chucked into the composter by a retarded gardener (moi), but will probably be napped upon by our dog who is a total plant napper.

And, according to the photo collage (which isn't as handy as I'd imagined since I've had to do all this elaborate referencing that's starting to really annoy me), we're back at the cherry tree now, which is in full bloom and YAY because maybe this year we'll pull more than a pound of cherries from it so I can make things like pie.

And you know how we like pie.

So that's it. I'm off the hook. I don't *have* to pay any more attention to anything other than the vegetables I'm about to plant this weekend until, like, October when the vegetables are dying out and I remember there are other things in my yard that want photo shoots and undivided attentions and thing.

So needy.

Tomorrow: Beans, cucumbers, lettuce, melons and tomatoes

Like I was saying...in May sometime...

My predictions held true and it's basically just now that I'm finally back paying attention to things other than the bees.

Because wildflowers don't swarm into a scary buzzing mass on your shitty neighbors' fence and therefore require immediate containment so the reminder to deal with them is sorta less prevalent, let's say.

I imagine this is the reason more people plant wildflowers than keep bees, but what the hell do I know since I do both.

Plus, the other day, I made a failed attempt at fixing the light on my bike only to have to call Bubba away from his important Putting the New Grill Together project to help me twist a screw, so in addition to playing with 10,000 stinging insects and planting pretty flowers, I also dedicate time to pestering my  husband away from more pressing demands.

I'm just full of hobbies.

Anyway, I wanted to show you why my neighborhood thinks I'm bizarre. Also - give those of you who are interested in the progression of the front yard meadow an update on that mess. Handy that they are concepts one in the same.

Lawn, lawn, lawn, lawn, WILD ASS MEADOW SPILLING OVER THE SIDEWALK, lawn, lawn, lawn...

Yeah, the meadow is not what you might call restrained or orderly. You might call it pretty, whimsical, natural or xeric, but you definitely wouldn't call it tidy or organized.

That's in the backyard where I exercise my anal retentive side. I reserve the front yard for my I'm Off My Rocker side.

Back garden - neat and tidy

Front yard - WTF?! It's in my eyes! Is that a lady bug? Look at that big ass lizard!

Strangely enough, that's where the bees would rather hang out.

Want to attract bees to your yard? Throw a few borage seeds on the shittiest soil you have and watch the madness unfold.

They may not be honeybees but I have a definite soft spot for big, fuzzy, pollen hogging bumblebees in my poppies.

And this used to be the pee hole. We've come a long ways, y'all.

It may not have helped my neighborhood persona to be sitting on the sidewalk with my camera buried in the borage growing wild in the sidewalk patch for a solid half hour, but I sure did love seeing all my bees (every bee is MY bee, obviously) hogging down on the borage.

At least I'm not mowing a lawn. THAT is what real crazy people do.

Also new in the front yard - ALL THE GAURA MY MOM GAVE ME X100.

People, do you grow this stuff, Gaura? Because my mom does. And she has for as long as I can remember. And now that I think about it, she probably has no choice in the matter because as I'm coming to find out, this stuff will be right up there with cockroaches and Twinkies in the post-apocalyptic circle of life. Which, is kind of nice since it's pretty -  unlike cockroaches and what Twinkies do to your ass if you eat too many. Not that I know. I haven't had a Twinkie in probably 20 years, but I'm getting off topic.

See, last year, when I was all, "Mom, I have a bare patch in the front meadow, what should I put there that I can forget about forever without it dying?" she immediately ripped some Gaura from her yard, threw it into a pot WITHOUT DIRT and then let it sit on her back patio for, I'm guessing, weeks before handing it off to me to grow in my yard.

And you should know that when I got it, it did sort of look a bit ratty, but as soon as I planted it, it perked up and looked fine.

Which should have been my warning.

But, since that evidently did NOT serve as poignant enough warning for me, the one hundred little Gaura sproutlings that shot up in the front yard, gutter and sidewalk cracks this spring certainly should have.

Dudes - this stuff is bullet proof. And prolific. And it's a damn good thing it's nice looking and takes a brutal pruning like a champ because holy crap there's no stopping it now.

It's pink. It's white. It has green foliage. It has red foliage.

It's even man enough to fight back against the Mexican Feather grass and fescue. Whoa.

And against the patio you can see it beginning to take over UGHverywhere.

So, for those of you looking to plant something in Zone 9 or 10 that will be drought tolerant, abuse tolerant, frost tolerant, thrive through brutal prunings, reseed itself to cover all unplanted spaces, produce cute flowers, have a nice grassy effect AND outlive the End of Days - try Gaura.

And then begin sharpening your pruners.