Winter has arrived with vengeance!

It's bitterly cold outside and snowing right now. From where I'm sitting I can see the windows lit up from outside by the white Christmas lights that I wove through the white-painted birch branches in the cedar planters outside. So pretty!

I finally put some lights on the holly and burning bush outside the front window today. It was a cold, rainy afternoon...so I took advantage of the few hours before it started to snow to go ahead and run some lights out front before everything would be blanketed with a fresh coat of snow.

I do have to admit, although the decorations are pretty and I love to see pretty red and gold bows festooning the outside of my house...I really do not like winter! I think I have seasonal affective disorder (SAD) - either that or I'm part bear and just want to hibernate all winter.

I actually ordered one of those therapy lights for SAD (which I'm impatiently waiting for!). I'm hoping that might knock me out of hibernation mode and get my creative juices flowing.

There is so much to do before Christmas - so many cookies to bake and a Christmas Eve menu to plan!

I decided to make a batch of cookies tonight...from whatever I had in the pantry. I ran out of butter, so I had to work with butter flavored Crisco. And all I had was one package of chocolate-peanut butter swirl chips and a packet of premelted unsweetened Hershey's cocoa. Here's what I came up with:

Chocolate-Peanuty Oatmeal Whole Wheat Messes

1 c. butter flavor Crisco
1 c. firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 c. granulated sugar
2 eggs2 tbsp. milk
2 tbsp. vanilla
2 1/2 c. Quaker oats (old fashioned, uncooked)
1 1/2 c. whole wheat flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 package chocolate-peanut butter swirl chips
1 packet Hershey's premelted unsweetened chocolate

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Beat first 6 ingredients until smooth. Add combined, oats, flour, soda and salt; mix well. Stir in remaining ingredients.

Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls 3 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 8-10 minutes for chewy or 10-12 minutes for crisp cookies. Cool 2 minutes; remove to wire rack. Cool completely. About 4 dozen.

They're probably a million calories each...but it's winter, so who cares! They actually taste pretty good...a hint of peanut butter and chocolate, but not too much. You could probably use pure chocolate chips if you want it more chocolaty.

Wow...a whole month went by!

Wow...I can't believe a whole month went by! August was busy, busy, busy! We had our cedar fence installed. It took the builders 3 days to complete it. Before we had it installed we buried a drain tube across the back of our yard so that we don't get flooding from our neighbor's sump pump outlet which dumps out right on our property line. It has helped tremendously. No more standing water...no more mosquitoes brewing in our yard.

We also installed a short retaining wall just inside of the fence so that we could build up the soil before planting along the fence. This is what we wound up planting:

5 5' tall arborvitae
2 red twig dogwoods
2 variegated Japanese silver grass
1 aster
2 beebalm
2 black eye susans
2 milkweed (alsclepias)
1 cardinal flower
1 Chinese lanterns
1 coral bells
1 coreopsis
1 crocosmia
2 echinacia
2 foxglove
3 hyssops
1 liatris
4 mums
1 monkshood
2 sedum
2 yarrow

We added a ton of new peat moss and soil and bag after bag of mulch to the back of the yard and corner gardens. We also ran 150' of soaker hose under the mulch to help keep things moist and cut down on the daily watering.

In the front of the house we planted 3 limelight hydrangea along the porch and living room windows. We had to rip some of the old shrubs out to make way.

I'm really happy because my oceana blue salvia did come back and just started blooming last week. I saved the seeds from the plant last year and planted it up indoors in March. I have 4 or 5 plants that made it and they're all starting to bloom that beautiful royal blue color. The Bella Donna delphiniums are on their 2nd bloom cycle too...they are just breathtaking next to the almost black Thai basil.

We're about 75% done with the stone pavers in the front. The left side of the walk is done and so is the small island. The pavers that go along the front of the house have made it almost all the way to the corner. Now we have just about 25 pavers left to lay and about 15 caps to cut. It's been a long, slow project! And this near 90 degree weather has not been helping us to finish any faster!

I want to get everything done because we're having our daughter's 2nd b-day party (and informal open house) this coming Sunday. So it would be nice to be done with projects so we can relax and enjoy everyone's company and actually enjoy all the blooms around our house.

Hot..hot..hot..

Wow...is it hot this week! It's in the 90's and hasn't rained in over a week. I just heard some thunder, so perhaps we will get a little rain today. The lawn looks horrible. I think grubs got a hold of the back right corner of the yard, because the grass there looks really stressed out.

I keep seeing Japanese Beatles all over the front and back yard...and have even noticed some skeletal leaves on one of the ornamental trees in the back yard.

Our backyard neighbors have had contractors in their yard all week installing a brick paver patio. A week from now we will have contractors in our yard installing a 5 foot privacy cedar fence along the back border of our yard and a 4 foot picket cedar fence along the sides.

I still have to clear away some lawn in front of the back edge of the yard so that I can prepare a new bed for perennial plantings once the fence is installed.

I also stopped at Home Depot today to check out what's on sale and came home with 3 limelight hydrangea bushes. I couldn't resist...they were only $35 each and about 3 feet tall. I think I'm going to plant them in front of the living room picture window so that we have something nice to look at in the summer and to lighten up the front of our dark brown house.

I also came home some yarrow, tickseed and varigated grass.

What's growing this year

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  This is not a complete list:
  
  A = Annual, P = Perrenial
  
  Whites
  
  Obediant Plant 4
  Cosmos "Sonata Mix" A 1
  Dusty Miller "Silver Dust" A 12
  Dianthus "Telstar White" A 3
  Cleome Spider Plant "White" A 2
  Gladiolus P 12
  Sweet Woodruff P 1
  
  Yellow/Orange
  
  Moonbeam Coreopsis P 3
  Canna "King City Gold" P 1
  Tickseed "Coreopsis Early Sunrise" P 3
  Tickseed "Coreopsis Sunfire" P 1
  Gazania A 3
  Osteospermum hybrid "Orange Symphany" A 2
  Celosia "Fresh Look Orange" A 4
  Celosia "Fresh Look Yellow" A 4
  Lantana "New Gold" A 3
  Calibrachoa hybrid "Superbells Saffron" A 2
  Marguerite Daisy "Butterfly" A 2
  Winter Pansy "Yellow" P 6
  Blanket Flower "Gaillardia Arizona Sun" P 1
  Canna "Orange Beauty" P 1
  Lily P 2
  Tulips P 16
  Gladiolus P 12
  
  Red/Pink
  
  Pentas 12
  Bee Balm - "Marshalls Delight" P 4
  Zinnia "Profusion Double Cherry" A 16
  Geranium "Pink Sizzle" A 2
• Geranium "Americana Pink" A 2
  Veronica "Giles Van Hees" P 2
  Cardinal Flower "Lobelia Queen Victoria" P 1
  Cleome Spider Plant "Pink" A 1
  Hollyhock P 3
  Coral Bells "Peach Melba" P 1
  Scarlett Runner Bean A 5
  Sedum "Autumn Joy" P 1
  
  Purple/Blue
  
  Monkshood P 1
  Nemsia "Blue Bird" A 4
  Salvia "Victoria Blue" A 9
  Nierembergia "Robe Purple" A 4
  Flowering Cabbage "Osaka Mix" A 12
  Lobelia "Riviera Mix" A 6
  Verbena "Obsession Blue with Eye" A 4
  Cosmos "Sonata Mix" A 5
  Purple Fountain Grass "Rubrum" A 2
  Russian Sage "Perovskia" P 1
  Phlox "Emerald Blue" P 12
  Delphinium "Summer Nights" P 1
  Echinacea "Prarie Splendor" P 2
  Butterfly Bush "Pink Delight" P 1
  Pincushion Flower "Scabiosa Butterfly Blue" P 2
  Liatris P 6
  Forget-Me-Not P 12
  Balloon Flower P 2
  Campanula Flower P 1
  New England Aster P 1
  Bearded Iris P 1
  Japanese Iris P 1
  Clematis P 1
  Gladiolus P 12
  Tulips P 12
  Muscari P 30
  
  Greens
  
• Hostas "Aureo-marginata" 3
• Hostas "Golden Tiara" P 2
• Hostas "Guacamole" P 1
• Hostas "Krossa Regal" P 1
• Potato Vine "Marguerite" A 2
• Feather Reed Grass "Overdam" P 1
• Maiden Grass P 1
  

Vegetables/Herbs

• Basil - Genovese & Purple frilled
• Dill
• Fennel
• Thyme - regular & varigated
• Sage - regular & golden
• Green Oregano
• Parsley - curly & flatleaf
• Chives - regular & garlic
• Snap Peas
• Golden Beets
• Yellow Pear cherry tomatoes
• Simpsons Black seeded lettuce

So, here are some of the things that have been growing (or rather, overgrowing) in the side and back yard. The fennel is nearly 5 feet tall already and a big storm snapped the top 2 feet of the peas over. The yellow pear tomatoes have tons of unripen fruit on them. I think the golden beets will be ready to harvest in a week or two. The lettuce has bolted (because of a week of 90+ degree weather).

It's coming along...

This is one of the beautiful blanket flowers growing in the front island. I love the colors. They remind of the sunsets in Arizona. It looks like it would be a Southwest flower!

This is a (blue) hydrangea. I haven't altered the pH of the soil, so it's coming up pink now that it's planted out in the island.

We have been working on redoing the front yard of our new home. It's gone from being absolutely devoid of any color (other than green plants and ugly white rocks) to being full of perenials and annuals of all colors and various hydrangeas, dogwood and viburnum.

The pavers are not fully installed. We haven't yet cut any of them and we need to finish laying the row at the front of the house. Once it's done we'll be 90% finished with the front yard. We just need to pick out some shrubs to spruce up the front for the non-flowering season.

Previous Owner's Landscaping

This is a picture of the NE side of the house - with the entry area.

Here is the front yard island - or the "Island of Rocks" as we called it. The rocks (thank God) are no longer there!

So here is the landscaping that the previous owners had. It's pretty boring - manicured evergreens and shrubs accented with white tumbled rocks. The overall mood of the landscaping was very somber. The dark bushes against the dark house had no contrast.

Since the entry of the house is on the NE side of the house it perpetually in the shade. Nothing pops in the shade.

Before the Fall of '07 we had all the manicured evergreens on the left side of the entry removed and 2 truckloads of rock hauled away to make room for more lively plantings and mulch.

I'm going to call to the landscapers that hauled the rock away last year to find out how much 3 or 4 cubic yards of much and a partial truckload of topsoil will cost. Hopefully they can deliver it in the next week or so because I'd really like to start planting up the island and corner of the entry and covering it all with mulch. The soil is absolutly horrible! It's about 2 inches of soil and then you hit clay and rock. So I'm adding sand and peatmoss in with the soil to help with the drainage.

We also need to complete the retaining walls around the sidewalk to the door. before the soil comes.

Slowly the front yard is evolving into something much more NATURAL looking and is starting to feel "ours" rather than "theirs".

Spring has come...at a new address

Well, the past 9 months have been crazy hectic. We've moved to a new address - northwest of the city out in suburbia. We're still windy city gardeners at heart.

So the new house has many landscaping challenges - ton's of clay, poor drainage in spots, low spots, tree roots and a very sloped back yard. My initial plans for a large vegetable garden have been thwarted by these landscaping hurdles. This summer I'm just going to stick to growing my herbs and vegetables in a small plot with southern exposure and in containers.

Right now we have a couple projects going on - in the front I've expanded the island by about 10 feet lengthwise and need to have some topsoil and mulch delivered to build up the island. I'm trying to finish the short retaining walls on both sides of the front walk and am replanting the area directly in front of the main door. It used to be full or arborvitae and other "manicured' evergreens. I'm going for a more natural, perennial look accented with ornamental grasses and annuals.