Why I Oughta...

Could it be quarantine that is getting to me?  Seems likely.  As I'm now dreaming about the installation of a small pond and waterfall in our backyard.   This isn't a new idea, as I've posted about water features over the years here on the blog - including a schematic that showed how it could work across our yard in February .  Today, I'm sharing this photo of a spot that is adjacent to our back patio that I'm now focusing my attention on in terms of initial pond placement.   Below, you can see a schematic (new one) of what I'm thinking (currently) about where things could go and how they'd work together.  Importantly, I'm trying to think about this in phases and making sure that we can make future phases work with the initial undertaking.    The new schematic calls for a pond located to the south of the patio with a small berm and waterfall that is backed up to where the air conditioning units are located.  Then, utilizing the existing grad

In the latest Garden Design email that went out last week , I saw a photo of a patio that was beautiful.  But, also gave me a little bit of wondering as to what we can do with our current patio.  Oh, you're not getting the Garden Design email?  Head here and subscribe .  It is free and - for me - is the email newsletter that I read and click on everytime it arrives.  No skimming for me. In the newsletter, she linked to this story about outdoor living space and included this photo of someone's dreamy patio that faces what look the marshland that borders the Cloister at Sea Island.  Here's that photo with a couple of MY red circles calling attention to something: Not my photo.  Original source can be found here . In those two red rings, I've highlighted some patio-border shrubbery.  What I think are probably boxwoods or yews or something similar.  The oval on the right snows a patio corner installation that I want to focus on here.  Now...that looks like someth

Right at the end of last year, I posted a photo of a Wave Hill Garden chair and talked about how I was struck by the design of the chair - and the fact that it wasn't a traditional adirondack chair that you see everywhere.  We had spent some time in Luxembourg Gardens in Paris last year and fell in love with lots of things - including their chairs - and have been thinking about how I bring a chair or two to our backyard and garden.  The Wave Hill chair seemed to scratch me right where I itch. A gardener named Dan Benarcik has developed plans for the chair and is selling them for $35 (the updated plan version) on his site . I put the idea of creating a chair like this on my 2020 Gardening To-Do List .  #11 on the list is to 'build something' like these chairs (or a raised bed).  I haven't sprung for the plans (yet), but I've been nosing around the Web for some additional inspiration.  I came across this post on Reddit that featured a photo of a modified Wave

Welp, here we go with even more backyard planning and dreaming.  It was just a couple of days ago that I posted my 2020 to-do list with 25 things that I'd like to prioritize .  And then just yesterday, I went ahead and posted my initial findings about Japanese Maples - which weren't even on that list.  In a few posts talking about the priority areas for the yard, I mentioned that the hardest part I have with gardening right now is STICKING WITH MY PLAN.  I'm like a bug drawn to the bright light of garden centers and see plants and trees that are NOT in my initial plan.  I have to remind myself:  prioritize and stick to the plan.  Once that is done, we can explore enhancements. Welp...this post is all about what I'd call a major 'enhancement'.  And how I got here was the whole research about Japanese Maples .  And thinking about their placement.  I started to think about our patio and the patio trees that I've been thinking about since we moved in.  R

Just took one day for me to have to add other items to my 'backyard dream' list.  Yesterday, I posted my 2020 to-do list and today, I'm talking about adding something to our yard that WAS NOT on that list.  I supposed that's ok, because this isn't something that I am going to add THIS YEAR.  I suppose this could be something that I'd put on my 2021 or beyond to-do-list.  Let's call this just simply a [ backyard dreaming ] post. In yesterday' post, I included #11 which calls for me to "build something" and I mentioned a couple of ideas including a  garden chair , a  Versailles box , a Raised bed, some Insect houses, a  Wattle Fence .  and finally a  bird nesting box/platform .  Today, I'm adding to that potential 'build list' with a Bocce Ball Court. I came across this post on the Landscaping Network site that lays out the details of adding a Bocce Ball Court to your backyard .   They talk about the materials, the dimensions/spa

You can't swing a gardening blogpost around the Web these days without people warning gardeners like me (beginners!) to be VERY careful of plantlust and Spring Black Friday mania.  That means...don't fall in love with plants and then 'find a home for them'. That's what I've done far too often. Instead, all the gardening bloggers/experts (dare I say....ummmm..."influencers") will tell you that having a plan is the KEY to a garden design. In an effort to reinforce this notion with myself, I'm publicly committing to trying to stick to my priorities this year.  We have a large yard that is NOT anywhere near done.  We need so much plant material.  But, we also have a professional plan.  And, instead of winging it, I'm going to try to stick to it as best I can.  And, because I did some "winging it" over the past two Summers, that means adapting the plan to incorporate some of the existing materials. This is the third in the series of

A couple of days ago, I discussed that I'm very susceptible to 'plant lust' and 'tree lust' once the Winter thaw breaks and Home Depot and Menards start to put out their nursery stock.  The traps there are well-established.  First, buying stuff and then trying to 'figure out where to put it' is not a good approach.  Not to mention that the Big Box stores tend to feature A LOT of Spring/early Summer flowering items (so we are naturally drawn to them!) and if you plant what they have in stock and on sale, you often-times end up with a NON-four-season garden.  You get a lot of show in say...Spring.  But, you have a boring Summer and Fall (and even Winter) garden.  Because we had a professional do our plan, I just need to stick to it.  And not stray too far. Unlike years past, I'm going into this season of plant buying with a FIRM plan.  That means focusing on three areas - maybe two and a half areas - for enhancing the view from our patio.  The fir

If you follow along on the Web for any hobby you might be interested in, you are certain to come across posts/articles in the early part of the calendar year that are all about 'trends to watch in 2020'.  One of the pieces that I read recently is this one called ' What will be the hot gardening trends of 2020? '.  There are some things in there that I think I see popping up over-and-over like "Plant Parenting" and the adoption of succulents (due to climate change/low water usage, etc), but there was one item that really got my attention:  Garden Nooks.  Those little 'secluded spot' that you can create in your garden.  From PennLive : Jody Davey, an indoor horticulture and programs specialist at Hershey Gardens , says she’s seeing more people interested in creating secluded spots for relaxing and enjoying their yard’s gardens. “Part of the reward of nurturing a garden is spending leisure time in the beautiful outdoor space you’ve created,” she said.

Another day, another 'tree dreaming' post here on the blog.  And guess what? It features another columnar form tree , of course.  But this one is a conifer.  If you've followed along on the blog, you'll know that I'm pretty far behind when it comes to conifers in the landscape.  I included this note in my 2019 "to do list" that called for 'adding more conifers" .  I added eight in 2019 (see results here ), but six of them were TINY.  I mean... TINY .  Those six Canadian Hemlocks ( now five ) aren't going to be meaningful in our garden for many years.  Still have quite a bit more work to do, I think - and especially as I think about replacing the (LOST) Weeping Cedar . This post is about a variety of tree that we haven't planted yet: a pine.  This is called a Columnar Eastern White Pine tree that Monrovia lists as being hardy all the way down to Zone 3. Here's a photo from Gertens : Note: This is not my photo.  Found it via Ger

With the hard gardening days on me in mid-January (and not being a seed catalog guy), I've turned to dreaming about trees, shrubs and grasses.  And that means that today, I'll post another 'tree dreaming' post to create a document/reference post for future use in my landscape/garden/backyard planning.  A few days back, I shared two deciduous columnar trees that I wanted to create reference posts about here on the blog: the Columnar Swedish Aspen and the Dakota Pinnacle Birch . Today, I'm posting about the Slender Hinoki Cypress .  I'm filing this under [ columnar trees ], but I suppose this is technically a 'narrow, upright form' and not necessarily columnar.  And...technically, this is a shrub, not a tree.  But...this is my garden diary, so I'm calling the shots. The Slender Hinoki Cypress is 'pyramidal form' that has new growth with  'ferny appearance'.  Love that. Via Monrovia : Description via this Monrovia listing .  

There are "seed people" - those gardeners who spend the cold, dark days of January and February getting their seedlings going - pouring over catalogs, ordering supplies, turning on the lights, etc.  Me?  I'm more of a 'tree/shrub/plant/perennial dreamer' during those same months.  Just a couple of days ago, I shared this Slender Hinoki Cypress (tree form) that I'm lusting after to add to the backyard and mentioned how it is often part of a "Japanese Garden".  Over the years here on the blog, I've done a bunch of 'tree dreaming' posts, but this one is a little different:  let's call it 'Grasses Dreaming'.  This post is about a grass that I came across on the Monrovia site these: All Gold Japanese Forest Grass . Here's a look at them from Monrovia : This photo is not mine - via Monrovia here .   Others, like Michigan Bulb  carry something that is close, but not the same including this Golden Hakone Grass - and p

With the calendar turning over to the new year soon, my mind has naturally drifted outdoors to our backyard to think about what kind of 'tree planning' we should be doing in Spring.  Right after Christmas, I posted my front yard tree succession planting plan .  And because we've been filling our bird feeder, my mind has been focused on the area you see in the photo above.  I've covered this section of yard before with this Fall of 2017 post showing the landscape plan here . Of note, what I'm showing here differs from what the plan includes, but that's because the plan doesn't call for many new trees, but instead uses the existing trees and augments them with shrubs. To set the context - or edges - of this image, you can see two trees that I've posted about before. First, in purple, on the left is the Weeping White Spruce Columnar tree . And, in red, on the far right is the Weeping Cedar tree that I planted and lost .  I've left the corpse

Photo of a pair of Wave Hill Garden Chairs from Wave Hill's official site here .  This is not my photo above.  Back earlier this year - after a trip to Paris with Nat - I went on and on and on about our visit(s) to Luxembourg Gardens.  It was really the highlight of our trip together.  I posted about how they were (as the French do!) using cocoa bean hull mulch , their tree boxes , growing vines between mature trees , their special metal path edging , how t hey have enormous stands of Chestnut trees that they prune in a special way , and their pretty spectacular espalier garden . And...in addition to swooning over all of those items,  I posted about the chairs at the gardens .  Those chairs.  Really quite special.  There are a couple of worthwhile 'histories of the Luxembourg Garden Chairs' posts on the web, but this one from Fermob - the distributor of the chairs - is the one I'd spend my time on. It is interesting to me to think about how a garden like Luxemb

Not my photo.  Not my pizza oven.   Found it here online . Over the years, I've posted about my pizza oven dreams.  Backyard pizza oven dreams.  All the way back in 2010, I posted this photo of what I THEN called my "Dream Pizza Oven" .  And in 2011, I posted another photo that showed off a little 'roof' out front of an oven that I collected as inspiration.  That's close to ten years ago, so this *dream* has been going on for a while - as far back as our original house in Elmhurst.  But, when we moved, the backyard pizza oven dream didn't die and I even posted about the various locations that I could put it here on the blog .  And that brings me to today and *this* oven that you see above. I came across it online last week and have revisited the photo a few times now.  To be totally clear, that is NOT my photo above.  You can find the original here .  But, let's look at a few things that jump out to me in terms of pizza oven inspiration.  Fir

Every year, we attend something called "Fairy Fest" at the Growing Place in Naperville.  We build some Fairy garden stuff, have a little tea party, buy some tiny plants and then hang out with this guy in a gnome costume.  Or...a gnome.  He's pretty believable.  One of the things he tells the kids is that any garden with a gnome is going to be happier, healthier and wiser.  I kind of glommed on to that statement and have been pointing out the one gnome we have out back.  I don't think I've ever posted specifically *about* him, but I do have this photo (scroll down) in this post that shows off the current gnome that inhabits our backyard .  He doesn't have a name, but I've had him for close to ten years.  I think Nat bought him from Target and he's done a fine job making our backyard happier, healthier and wiser.   He's cast iron and has weathered being outside for those (almost) ten years and I really like him. However, you know what is bette

Just a couple of days ago, I posted the latest in my love letters to Luxembourg Gardens with my post about the chairs they have there .  Prior to that post, I shared a series of things that I have been drawn to about the garden including posts  about the vines growing between trees by the Medici Fountain , the tree boxes,   the cocoa bean shell mulch  and  the colors of the flower beds that inspired our own raised planter mix .  Today comes these little metal edges.  They're half circles or little hoops and they kind of overlap each other to form an edge to the walking paths.  What's that you say?  Jake...you've been talking about a walking path in your own backyard for a while now.  That's right !  I'd been thinking about using something a little bit more formal with uniform metal edging to keep the crushed granite in place, but this little bit of whimsy via Luxembourg Gardens has me wondering if I can think about using different types of edging?  I mean, this

I could post for 100 days straight and I don't think I would run out of things to say and share about Luxembourg Gardens in Paris.  Yesterday, I posted about the green tree boxes .  Today are a couple of photos of a fountain area that is in the northeast corner of the garden.  It is a reflecting pool with a large fountain at the far Eastern edge that is lined by (I'm pretty sure that they're) London Plane trees or perhaps just Plane Trees since they're NOT in London?!?! The trees themselves are magnificent.  There are four or five on either side of the reflecting pool that are placed in a line.  In between these trees is ivy.  You can see it in the photos at the top and bottom of this post.  The ivy is trained from the central base in between the trees - and the space in between the trees - and trained out in two angles.  Where it meets the trees, it is then trained back across in a straight line.  Look at it in the photos.  Amazing, isn't it?  The vines