Why I Oughta...

Add two trees.  Take one away.  That's what has happened recently with the addition of the pair of Kousa Dogwood trees along the garage wall (pre-espalier) .  And now...the documenting of losing one of the original trees that I planted when we bought our lot:  a Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree.   Before we moved in, we planted five trees:  a dawn redwood (Died and replaced), a Chanticleer Pear Flowering Tree (in the back, between the tree swing tree and the Hornbeams.  Still alive).  A pair of Greenspire Linden trees that I've espaliered.  Still alive.  And this Japanese Flowering Cherry tree.  Now dead).    After we moved in, I planted a Corkscrew Willow (dead) and a Crimson King Maple (also dead).   That first year, our landscaper planted two trees:  a Saucer Magnolia and a Flowering Pear Tree.  The first of which died, but was replaced.   All-up, that means that first year (2017), we planted: 9 trees.  5 of which (now) died.  Three were not replaced (Willow, Flowering Cherry,

The Cherry Blossoms are in bloom.  At least in our backyard.  The photos below show our Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree in bloom with pink flowers and red-to-maroon foliage.  Those leaves turn out ordinary - green-colored - as the Spring and Summer wears on.   This tree was bought in Mid-May in 2017 as we were still building our new house.  We planted this ahead of our occupancy and had to baby it as the heat of Summer arrived .   For the full tale of the tape, here's the history of this tree below.  It has bloomed five of six years with 2019 being the only year we saw no flowers.   2017: Bloomed (when purchased) in mid-May . 2018: Bloomed that first Spring after being planted in mid-May . 2019: No blooms. Looked like it wanted to in mid-May . 2020: Bloomed (during the pandemic) in early May . 2021: Bloomed in late April (photos in this post were taken on April 28, 2021) 2022:  Bloomed in mid-May. (photos taken on May 11). 2021 was the earliest (late April), but the other four

2021 marks the second year in a row that we are being treated to some pink peony-like Cherry Blossoms on our Japanese Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree (or... as the Missouri Botanical Garden points out...it is also called the "Kanzan" vs. "Kwanzan" .  I'm thinking I'm going to start calling this a Kanzan from here out...) in our backyard.  Our tree was bought from Menards after my first trip to Tokyo in 2017 and we planted it right around Earth Day that year.  It was blooming when I bought it.   This was the first Japanese-inspired piece of our garden puzzle - that have been subsequently complemented with the Japanese Maple tree, ferns and some grasses.   So...let me do a list here: 2017: Bloomed (when purchased) in mid-May . 2018: Bloomed that first Spring after being planted in mid-May . 2019: No blooms.  Looked like it wanted to in mid-May .   2020:  Bloomed (during the pandemic) in early May . 2021:  Bloomed in late April (photos in this post were taken

For the first time since 2018, we have some Cherry Blossoms in our yard.  And it is so nice to see them appear on our Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree that was inspired by my first trip to Tokyo .  Back in the Spring of 2017, I was able to see some of the famed Cherry Blossom trees in Japan and when I came back home, I sought out a tree.  I found one at Menards in May of 2017 .  We were in the midst of building our new house, so my plan was to plant it in our new backyard.    It was flowering when I bought it and the next Spring - May of 2018 - it flowered .  Last Spring - 2019 - it seemed like it wanted to flower , but it never did.  It wasn't alone - as our Saucer Magnolia and Rhododendrons didn't flower, either last year.    I posted a photo of some Winter damage on this tree in January of this year . And today?  It is starting to show some blossoms.  Less than ten so far, but I'm hopeful for a full tree of pretty pink blossoms.  They remind me of peony flowers - Nat

I was out puttering around the yard on a mild Winter day recently doing a little bit of bud inspection to see what trees had put off when I found this break in this Japanese Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree in the backyard.  I bought this tree in May of 2017 when it was a small (maybe .75" caliper) tree from Menards after I had just come back from my first trip to Tokyo where I saw *their* Cherry Blossom trees.  The tree (in the garden center at Menards) caught my eye because it was flowering these beautiful, puffy, almost-peony-like pink flowers . At the end of June/early July of 2017, right when we were moving into our house in Downers Grove, I got around to planting the tree in the yard .  About half-way back in the yard, on the southside of the property.  Not sure, exactly why it ended up there.  Just *felt* right at the time.  Looking at the tree now, I think it is in a good spot and the placement ended up being appropriate. The first season it was in the ground - Spring

I snapped this photo of the freshly burst free leaves from our Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree a couple of weeks ago, so the {post-date} on this post is a little inaccurate.   So let's call this May 2nd or so in terms of usefulness in the [ garden diary ] purposes.   This photo is going up almost a week after I shared the same Kwanzan Cherry trees in bloom down in St. Louis .  That post is here .     The tree still has not bloomed, but once it does, I'll grab some photos and add them to the [garden diary] post over on HornbeamHill.com . Should be any day now based on a May 21st bloom in 2018 .   We have a few other flowering trees in our yard, but there are a few on my radar to acquire including an Eastern Redbud tree - maybe a multi-trunk variety (??) and maybe another flowering Cherry.  I think I saw a Yoshino Cherry at Home Depot on one of our trips.  Maybe it will come home with us.

I mentioned in a few posts that we were in St. Louis recently to show the kids Nat's old stomping grounds.  It turned out to be a blend of vacation time with a little bit of work mixed in.  One of the mornings, I was trying to make a couple of work conference calls during our trip to St. Louis and found myself outside of the Kaldi's Coffee (Nat's favorite!) that is adjacent to Concordia Park.  You can find the location here .  The kids were eating their breakfast and I snuck away for some quiet. While I was pacing and doing the calls, I came across this small Kwanzan Cherry Tree that was in bloom and beautiful.  I'm familiar with the Kwanzan Cherry Tree because it is the same variety that I bought and planted after my first trip to Japan to see the Cherry Blossoms.  I took this photo a couple of weeks ago in St. Louis so they're clearly ahead of us bloom time because our tree hasn't bloomed yet.   But, they're behind the blooms that I saw in Japan on my

My trip to Japan (with brief stops in Tokyo on either side of a few days down in Nagoya) coincided with the Cherry Blossom Trees being in bloom.  This was the second time I've visited Japan during the Cherry Blossom bloom with the first one being back in 2017.  Here's a post showing the trees then .  I loved the experience so much that I decided to try to find a flowering Cherry Tree to add to our own backyard.  I ended up with this Kwanzan Flowering Cherry Tree .   The trees this time weren't as full as I think we came a little bit later (late March/early April) this time.   You can kind of see that in the photo above.  It has already bloomed and has lost some of the flowers.  In the photo below, you can clearly see the blooms had mostly fallen off already.   Doesn't mean it wasn't as beautiful.  It was and these photos don't do the trees justice.   This marks the third straight year for Cherry Trees with 2018 being a visit to DC for those alon

Spring flowers have hit our yard.  And also our flowering trees.  That includes our Kwanzan Flowering Cherry tree that is planted in our backyard.  The photo above is of some of the blooms that have emerged recently on the upper branches.  The history of this tree starts in March of 2017 when we bought it after a trip to Tokyo where I took in the Cherry Blossoms.  It lived on the driveway for a few months while we built our #newoldfarmhouse and we finally planted it at the end of June .  It survived the Winter and this Spring, buds started to open - despite the brutally long cold weather.  And now, it seems like it is on a good trajectory with new growth and seemingly happy in terms of sun/location in the yard.  Even after we added the one new bed to the south fence line, this tree is still kind of out on an island.  We laid down a ring of mulch ( but not a volcano !) around the tree and so it feels anchored, but will have to wait until next year when we add another line of beds

I'm one lucky guy.  At least when it comes to timing trips with the show that Cherry Blossom trees put on.  Last year, I was in Tokyo during the Cherry Blossom season and documented it here on the blog . And earlier this month, I found myself in our nation's capital when their own Cherry Blossom trees were on full display .   Double bucket list visits, right? I also brushed up on the reason for why the Cherry Blossom trees are even there . Each year, the National Cherry Blossom Festival commemorates the 1912 gift of 3,000 cherry trees from Mayor Yukio Ozaki of Tokyo to the city of Washington, DC. The gift and annual celebration honor the lasting friendship between the United States and Japan and the continued close relationship between the two countries. My trip to Washington D.C. was brief, but I was able to take in the trees from a few different vantage points.  (I've posted about another trip to DC all the way back in 2012 when I took this photo of the Washingt

Back at the end of May, I posted a few pics of the new flowering cherry tree that we picked up for Nat for Mother's Day this year .  It lived in the driveway at Equation Boy/Man's house for more than a month while the girls kept it watered.  Last week, we finally got around to putting it in the ground in our #newoldbackyard.  We found a nice spot that can be easily seen from the kitchen/family room as well as upstairs from the bedroom, but far enough back and to the side that it won't interfere with any future plans. We dug a good sized hole, the girls helped me get it situated down in the earth, then we covered it up with earth (and tried to put the grass back in place!) and applied one of these Treegator watering bags .  We've been filling it up every other day since we planted it and looking at the tree over the weekend, I see some new growth. So, hoping that whatever shock this thing will get from being transplanted into the ground is being absorbed by copiou

Earlier this Spring, I spent time in Tokyo where in addition to heading to Tokyo Disneyland and checking out the fish market, we were also there during the peak Cherry Blossom season.  I wrote about the trees here on the blog back in April .  I've been enamored with the trees ever since.  And trees have been on my mind lately as we continue to think about our yard.  I'm trying to get an early start on trees, because unlike sod or even flowers or bushes, trees take much longer to mature to the point to where they've grown into their size.  I've already posted about how we picked up a Dawn Redwood tree and planted it.   I also posted about the space we're going to fill in with either flowering pear trees or perhaps European Hornbeams along our northside.  And, of course, there's the Linden trees that I'm going to try to espalier .   (At what point, can we start calling it an arboretum??) For Mother's Day, I also picked up Nat a Japanese flowering

My trip to Tokyo was timed perfectly - in terms of seeing the famed Cherry Blossom trees in all their glory .  If you have ready anything about them this year, there was concern that they were emerging 'early' - officially - five days earlier than average .  Here in Illinois, we have our little 'blossom season' going on with the widely planted Cleveland Pear tree.  They're the trees that are blooming white flowers like crazy all over the suburbs.  They're a common tree planted in the front of new houses and in parkways and along parking lots.  They grow in a tight area and they are quite show-y during this period of time.   We had a Cleveland Select Pear tree in the front yard our old house and I loved it .  Loved it so much that I bought a few more.  (And we've included one in our plan for the new place.) But, back to these Cherry Blossoms.  We don't live in Seattle or DC - where these things are present.  So, I haven't really experienced '