Faerisweet's Garden Diary

4 Jun '07 4:04 pm

I am new to this forum and am starting a new garden. The first area I want to concentrate on is the backyard. I want to create a nice relaxing place to spend a quiet afternoon or evening. There are alot of trees, so it will have to be a shade garden. With inspiration from Dixie and her fairy garden, I want to do something similiar. Beds of shade plants with little fairies and gnomes, some fairy houses, maybe a toad house, and toadstools or mushroom's scattered amongst the plantings. I have already ordered a little fairy sculpture of a fairy asleep on a mushroom, her wings spread above her hold a mirrored gazing ball. It is only a foot tall so should fit well amongst some ferns. Also being a bit of a fairy buff I already have a few little fairy things that would work well.
My first project is a bed around Banjo's Tree, Banjo was my faithful dog who recently passed away and is buried beneath a large tree he enjoyed resting under in life. Here is a picture of him, you can't tell how wonderful and beautiful he was, I assure you the picture does not do him justice. He was the best friend a person could have and I consider myself very lucky he chose to follow me home from the little gas station close to where we lived, years ago. He had been abandoned or lost there for weeks and I would buy him treats whenever I came by, finally he decided not to wait for me to show up anymore and followed my car home. (Only a few blocks)[/img]

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This is where my daughter and I are putting the first bed of the garden, where Banjo rests.
I have bought some of the plants already, a sword fern, autumn fern, japanese painted fern, standard hosta, patriot hosta, a couple of bleeding hearts, some astilbe, persian shield, hosta fortunata, Hydrangea Niko Blue and quite a few other perennials. I can't think of the names now and also some annuals like coleus and impatiens. We plan to start digging the bed tomorrow and planting Tuesday, if the rain will stay away a couple of days. We have had rain nearly every day for a month. Anyway I will update as I go for anyone who is interested.[/img]

4 Jun '07 4:54 pm

Faerisweet - - We are ALL interested ! Go Girl !
Dixie.

4 Jun '07 8:51 pm

Hello there, faerisweet!

Welcome to the forum. I'm sorry I missed your initial post but I've been busy. Garden gnomes are supposed to be busy, don'cha know? Smile

I am quite delighted to tell you that my wife and I share some of the same flora as you. Last year I grew my first persian shield. I was very taken with it. This year I have two of them that I will plant in my north fence garden where the original one was. My wife has gone completely hosta mad and I have to skillfully scoot by gardening centres, otherwise Lord knows she will be buying more hostas. We tried to grow four astilbes two years ago. Last year only two survived and now this year we are down to one. Unfortunately, the winters here are extremely harsh.

I, too, am a big fan of ferns and one of my upcoming projects is a grotto on the north side of the house. So far, I have one fern, the poor little thing. He lingers around in our living room wondering what the heck he's doing indoors, cringing at the forced air heating and fending off the cats. But soon he will have a place of honor and be a very happy fern, indeed.

This is our first year for bleeding heart. We only have one right now in the old garden. We call it the old garden because it was the only flower bed on the property when we moved in. My wife, I'm sure, will be getting some impatiens again this year. She's particularly fond of the New Guinea variety. The ones we had last year had beautiful variegated leaves. However, this year, all the New Guinea impatiens we find have plain old green leaves and my wife is perplexed about this.

It's truly sad when we lose a pet who has come to mean so much to us. My wife and I both feel for you and your daughter for the loss of your good friend. It can be so hard. It's been five years now since my wife lost her good friends, her two cats Pearl and Bailey. They had been a comfort to her for 20 years and she still wipes an eye at the thought of them. I myself had a standard poodle called Zack who was very dear to me. I lost him to old age as well. It is a privilege to have known our friends and the pain that we feel in our hearts reminds us that our love for them was real. I think your new garden is going to be a very special place.

As for me, I have a "to do" list about a quarter mile long at least. Seems I'm wearing myself out regularly these days. I'm looking forward to future posts and pictures of your new garden.

All the best,

Christopher the Garden Gnome

4 Jun '07 8:53 pm

Yes please keep us informed I love to snoop over someones shoulder while they are building a garden. It is so exciting seeing a new garden come to life. I think you have chosen a great project.

5 Jun '07 3:01 am

This is a rare treat. No one else in my time here has shared a brand new garden from scrtch. You're the cook but anytime you'd like feedback on the 'broth', just put some photos up for us to savor and I'd be happy to tell you what I'm liking about it so far. This is exciting, like having a grandchild that you get to encourage and enjoy while some one else is doing all the clean up and maintainance. But fair is fair, I'll continue to post photos of what's happening in my garden for you to sample. By finding out what things you do and don't like we may be better able to advise more things you'd like.

5 Jun '07 7:16 pm

I'm very interested too, Faerisweet to follow the progress of your garden! Your plans sound wonderful and that lovely green space at your backyard is just waiting for your color paint! Do keep us posted! Thanks! Smile

Sorry to hear your loss of a good friend. As Christopher mentioned, your new garden will be a very special place indeed!

6 Jun '07 4:37 am

Thank you all for your interest.
Dixie, your fairy garden is a big inspiration to me. Loving all things fae, I could not help but see your postings first. Have you figured out how to make those mushroom seats yet? Please let me know if you do, I'd like to try a few of those.
Christopher (garden gnome) Thank you for your sentiments on my loss. My husband and son loved him very much too. They just grieve differently, they can not talk about him, it upsets them too much, and wanting to be tough men, they don't like to show any weakness. I am glad my daughter is more open about sharing her emotions, it seems to make it easier for the both of us to be able to talk and share our memories of him.
Glenn, snoop all you like, I will be looking over your shoulder too, LOL.
Mark, Yes, I love looking at your photos and getting ideas from all the wonderful gardens on this forum. So keep them coming and I will post some as soon as I get anything done. I had planned on starting yesterday, but of course it had to pour again. Today is better and I will get started this afternoon. I wanted to this morning but had a flower opportunity I couldn't pass up. A friend, non gardener, bought a house last year and the previous owners had planted bearded iris all around the property. I mean surrounding about 2 and a half acres and around each individual tree on it. They have just about every color you could want. Long story short, he doesn't want any, he likes a mow and go yard. So anyway, anyone that wants them are free to come and dig them out. Darn hubby, took the truck to work but my trunk and backseat held quite a few, now I have to vaccum out spilt soil. I just could not pass it up tho.
Jaqueline, Thank you, yes it will be special, my daughter is working on a memorial stone for him, to mark where he rests. Hubby put a little wooden cross but it won't stand up to the weather for long.
Well I better get out there and get busy, lots to do.

8 Jun '07 4:15 am

How lovely to be part of a project from the word go, and to share in all the hard work, excitement and - yes - heartache along the way. Keep posting!

The setting looks wonderfully peaceful. Where are you and what sort of tree is that?

8 Jun '07 4:44 am

Dear Faerisweet, sorry to be so long in welcoming you to the Forum. I am afraid I have been very distracted of late by preparing my gardens for an open garden tour.

I too will be watching with great interest as you develope this new garden. I believe your faithful companion and friend, Banjo, will keep you company whenever you work there. As often as we think of those we have lost, be it animal or human, they are with us in an instant.

Please post lots of pictures.

8 Jun '07 6:22 am

Jack,
yes the setting is peaceful, well it would be if I didn't have a 16 yr old daughter and 15 yr old son, not to mention their enormous crowd of friends, most of the time,lol. A crowd of teens tend to disrupt the peace, but really I love them being around. I feel lucky they all tend to hang out here. I am located in North Texas, outside a small town called Poolville. When I say small I mean small we have one little convenience store, a seed co. called Wilhites, a newly opened custom truck shop, the schools, several churches, and a post office. It is mostly ranches around here (cattle and horse), altho unfortunately lately there is a lot of drilling going on, for oil and natural gas. We happen to be on top of some large natural gas deposit in this area. I believe it is called Barnett's shale or something like that.

Here are my disturbors of the peace[/img]

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