Come on in through the gate, you are entering the third upper garden. The picture below is a 25 year crab apple that I transplanted from our lake home when we bought the land we are now living on. The flowers are just opening and in fall it outdoes itself with red crab apples the birds just love!
The gate is what we bought through a garden catalouge, along with the cement Pinapple that sit on two posts Dick put in . The stone wall Dick built me after I saw the movie "The secret garden", which made me want to replicate the scene. Because Dick had to dig a 6 foot deep trench which had to have cement poured in it, (Wisconsin winters and below zero weather will distroy anything made of cement unless is it on a base below the frost line). I dared not request an enclosed garden completely with stone walls! The cement truck came rolling in and backed to the spot that the wall now sits on. After the cement set up and was ready for the weight, Dick began to place the stones and cement them in, layer by layer. One layer had to dry and set before another layer could be put on top of it. I wanted it to look like an old foundation that was left from an ancient building so it had to go around the corner to make an angle. My patient dear husband worked all summer into fall on the wall after dinner and on weekends because at that time he was not retired yet. Did I tell you that it rests on a stony hillside? Oh my, It was like digging through gravel with large rocks in the soil six feet down. The area which the stone wall sits, the soil was not suited for beautiful rose bushes so Dick had to again dig down through all that gravely, rocky soil and replace it with the good farm loam that was down below the hill. Yikes!
Then when I planted the roses the next spring they would not grow because I didn't water them a lot, feed them a lot, and mulch them a lot....and we replaced them with a Smoke tree, sedum, and Oat decorative grass that would survive the dry conditions. It is now pretty and can withstand the arid inviorment that the cement stone wall gives it. The afternoon sun beats down on it besides the morning and noon sun. So it has intense heat. The mulch helps to keep it cooler and damp plus the trees in surounding area have reached a nice hight the past 25 years to give it dappled shade.
A birdseye view shows you the shrubs surrounding the garden and holds many shady perennials for one to see. We try and use natural plantings in these areas. Bushes will bloom all diferent times so there is color throughout the summer. Garden decorations have been held to a bare minimum. On the left is a piece of Dick's garden art nestled inthe false spierea which has flowers of white plumes.A bird house with red tulips catches morning lite.
A web trellis Dick made out of a large airconditioner grate from a factory he worked on sits between two posts from our married son's porch that he remodled and gave us the posts. Climbing roses grow here but the shade is starting to prevent all the bloom we use to have when the trees were put in 20 years ago. It is hard to remember that 25 years ago our hill was just an empty field with only grass growing.
A tall vase seperates the two roses and a bench gives you a chance to relax and smell the roses. This setting is the entrance out of the Secret Garden into the second garden on the lower edge.
The garden gate by the stone wall in the Secret Garden, leads you to the top of the garden into a setting of shade with hostas. The upper path takes you towards the house and sitting area where family and friends gather .
Birdhouses accent the path joining the Secret Garden and the sitting area. The upper part of hill is left to be wild with grasses and shrubs which often hide deer as they meander down to the creek on bottom of hill.
The creek is full and churning with an intense fast surge to get to its destiny. Later in the middle of summer it will lazily shrink to a gentle stream that might even dry up in late August if we have draught conditions.
Life is like that isn't it? As we follow our destiny, our path, that time leads us through, it surges with joy, aliveness, excitement and other times is is like August, drifting through hum drum sameness. Maybe in August we loose our excitement with summer. Winter somehow fills us with expectancy of what is ahead, we are tired of the cold, dreary cloud filled days and hope brings us to what is ahead. August can dull our passionate appreciation of nature, like in life, we seen it all, done it all, and we rest in the sameness of day after day. It calms our souls for what is ahead.
I love the feel of Spring! I quiver with excitement and discovery. The baby chickens hatching so tiny and fragile and within weeks look like gauking teenagers with feathers that reflect their mothers. I think only of today because I know all the tomorrows will bring decisions as to what will I do with the little roosters?
We took them out of their nursery and left them loose with their foster mom the silkie. They will spend a couple days in the barn's storage area where we keep the hay for the horses. It will give them a chance to hang out with mom, preparing them for the next bend in their path of life. They will be put in another nursery built into the corner of the large coop allowing them to get use to the big flock and the big flock getting use to them. They will be our new egg layers. The old hens slow down with their everyday delivery of eggs so we need to keep adding young stock to keep up our supply of those delicious fresh eggs. I do believe my memory has improved a lot since I have eaten so many eggs this past year. Who knows maybe I have discovered why Alhiemers has gotten so extreem in our society because we were all told to not eat eggs because of the high colestrol. But then we have to worry about our arteries getting clogged. One verses the other. I think I would like both!
Don't forget to smell the flowers......may life be good to you this coming week!
Kate
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