Our New Nest

Just came across the picture of the (vacated) nest we found in the yard as we were clearing out some weeds. What a nice way to be welcomed to our new nest by finding this one!

Throwing in the trowel...

"Gardening requires lots of water - 

most of it in the form of perspiration."  

~Lou Erickson~

Okay.  Guilty! We did it. We caved and hired a crew to come & get our yard into shape. It took exactly 8 days for us to admit that we were way in over our heads with all the overgrown plants, shrubs, trees & flowers and that they would quickly strangle us like stinkweed if we didn't bring in the pros. As I type, I can hear the whizzz and whirrrr of mowers, trimmers, weed-whackers and pure manpower drifting up from the yard.  They've been at it for 5 hours now and are about half-way to "that will do."  I have no doubt it will take months to get our yard into a place we can truly enjoy and years to get it to the yard and gardens of our dreams.  So, this is me admitting defeat - although feeling quite proud of myself for knowing when it was for me to wave the white flag.  In the end, I think we'll be much happier with the yard if we get to know it in small steps, over time.  There's a good chance I would be taking the first bus back to the city if it was me out there right now tangled up in poison ivy.  
I will share little Josie putting her green thumb to work in the planters on the porch with some of the flowers leftover from her visit to Chicago.  

And I must say here that my parents get huge gold stars for their two days of trying to whip our yard into shape.  You know it was a big project if even the two of them could only put a dent in it!  (Thanks for all your help mom & dad!)