Gestation

I'm off this week, so -- eight months after buying my condo and nearly seven months after moving in -- I finally got down to business with my patio/garden. This is how it looked on a dreary January day (and it hasn't looked a whole lot different over the subsequent months):

The weird curtain-like screen that did no good whatsoever and was ugly to boot is history. I plan to have a retractable screen installed next spring so I can sleep with the door open. (The patio is off the bedroom.)

I put the paint-spattered chairs (not mine) on the sidewalk and they found a happy home.

And here's how the garden looks as of today. It's a start. The ornamental grass, ferns, and hostas especially won't start coming into their own until next year. Everything will grow and spread. I can't wait for the dogs to see it. They've had no pretty scents to smell (a.k.a. plants to pee on) all this time.

Thanks to Meg for obtaining the oak splits bordering the beds; they're from a lumberyard on the Eastern Shore. I stained them mah-self. (Yes, that's a new fence; my neighbor replaced it since the first picture was taken.)

I dug up the rocks from the dirt that lies underneath the topsoil.

Note the Stonehengey rocks that formerly bordered the garden beds (see first photo). I don't really have a use for them but don't want to throw them away because I kind of don't hate them. So for now I've just lined them up on the ledge.

I've always been drawn to symmetry -- probably too much for my own good.

This is a potting shed made from a salvaged window shutter. My ex and I bought it and the rusty obelisk in the other garden bed in Frederick, Maryland. I got them in the divorce.

Grow, little planties, grow.

My garden and the city beyond.