Lavender

I love the light and colors of fall. As the nights lengthen, the purples, reds, oranges and yellows of autumn take over from summer’s greens (if we have enough rain) and tans (when we don’t, a more usual condition). I enjoy those deeper jewel tones. I love spring, but its pastel palette isn’t intense enough for my preference. Give me the stronger colors of autumn, the last colorful explosion before the muted white and blue palette of winter.

Autumn’s low light dusts the landscape with a luminescent glow. Light in the fall is more beautiful than light in any other season. Or maybe we appreciate it more as we watch the days fade away ever more quickly into long nights?

This plant may be named “lavender”, but I love its pure purple.

Long live fall!

In the gutter

Ideas exist to be adapted. My notebook is full of other people’s ideas that I hope to use myself. This is one of those ideas.

These folks got some old house gutter and turned it into flower pot, securing it onto their fence with attractive wrought iron holders. I love this idea. Rustic, recycled and fun. Of course, the flowers have frozen, so the planter lacks some of its punch. It definitely would look great in spring and summer, though.

Creative yard art

Earlier this summer, we noticed this beautiful home in another town. The homeowner had used her creativity to greatly improve her home’s curb appeal.

Homeowner was not home, so we did not get a chance to talk to her about her beautiful windows.

Neighbor said that windows originally graced homeowner’s grandmother’s church. When the church was demolished, homeowner bought the windows.

Since the homeowner was not present, we did not feel comfortable examining how the windows were hung. We can get vicious hailstorms here and we wondered how the windows were protected — if at all — from inclement weather.

We were very fortunate in our timing. The sun was setting at the time we looked at this home and its light filtered through the beautiful windows.

Homeowner also had an unusual gate. Instead of the standard gate, she had hung an old door. If we ever build a fence, I want a gate like that. The street signs shown in that picture were in the yard as well. I had wanted a street sign for our driveway before, but I really want one after seeing this.

Ideas exist to be adapted and used.

Just another brick on the ground

If you’ve read this blog for very long, you know that I love bricks. Red and yellow bricks are all over our yard as edging and pavers.

Monday I did a project I’ve wanted to do for some time. Apparently, our back door (just visible at upper left) was originally south of its current location. The sidewalk is just south of where the door currently opens, which means we must stand on the lawn to enter the door. Therefore, that patch is chronically bare. I hated the way it looked. I hated the mud and dust we tracked in because we had to stand on bare ground.

I took a stack of spare bricks and laid them out in that ugly place. As I anticipated, I didn't have enough spares. So I pulled the nails out of the fence posts I had rescued from the landfill. I removed the bricks I was using for edging the flower garden next to the back door and replaced them with the fence posts, now landscape timbers (shown at top in above picture). Those repurposed bricks weren’t enough, so I removed bricks from a straightway in other garden, replacing them with another fence post turned landscape timber.

The bricks sit up a bit too high. I am running a sprinkler on the newly-laid bricks. I hope I can saturate the ground enough that walking on them will push them into the ground. If that doesn’t work, I’ll dig out some of the dirt so they will sit more level with the ground.

I don’t like the pattern yet, so will tinker with it later.

Sunday, I added more bricks to the sidewalk running from the street to the back door. I didn’t like the pattern I’d originally used. I changed it and added more bricks. I’d like to add more bricks, but I’ve run out.

Unfortunately, I never run out of ways to use bricks. No stockpile is ever enough for all I have in mind. I’ll just have to keep my eyes open for more of them.

The pond garden

Pond Garden looking northeast. Coral bells and pepper plants are in foreground.

Pond Garden looking southwest. Blue spruce, pampas grass and volunteer green beans are in foreground.

The Frugal Gardener and her hubby have two main vegetable gardens. The narrow rectangles south of our house are the vegetable garden, currently planted with the Three Sisters on one side of the sidewalk and tomatoes and herbs on the other side of the walk. The other, an irregularly-shaped chunk of our backyard, is “The Pond Garden”.

The only water in that garden fills the bird bath. Hubby named it “The Pond Garden” because it’s shaped like a pond.

Our friend Kevin had shown us how to lay out natural-looking landscaping by using a garden hose. The hose marks sinuous curves for a relaxing, free-flowing appearance.

At that time, we had a large, ugly weed patch in our backyard. I hated it. I tried to avoid looking at it because I didn’t know what to do with it.

Then the mental light bulb turned on. I would turn that nasty patch into a garden, using the outlines of the weed patch to create natural-looking curves.

Instead of using a hose, I bought the cheapest can of orange spray paint I could find. I outlined the awful weed patch with the spray paint. Hubby tilled within the lines. I laid down salvaged red bricks for the border.

Previous owners had planted cedar trees and I had received a blue spruce from my brother and sister-in-love for my 40th birthday. We planted pampas grass in the gap between spruce and cedars for privacy, then scattered flowers in various parts of that garden. Flowers include coral bells and irises from my mother's garden. We have purple bee balm and lilies from Hubby's aunt's garden and coral hollyhocks from his parents' garden.

In the spaces that are left, we plant various vegetables each year. Volunteer buttercrunch lettuce returns every year.

An eyesore became something beautiful and productive for almost no money.