Sprung!

I have a goodly sized side yard that has generally just been a mass of weeds and good intentions. I've allowed it to get to the point that is is just a path from the front yard to the back and I have decided that since it is a nice sized space I would pave most of it over and use it as another patio space. Some nice ornamental plants in pots, a place to sit and have a chat and drink, etc.

But first, I gotta dig. I gotta dig a lot and level and scrape and tamp and level and haul and scrape and level and tamp.... You know the drill. I will need several yards of sand and I have over 200 paver stones in the backyard waiting to be used. Hopefully, it should be enough, but I got them for free so it worked out.

So, I started the digging portion of the project. I got a good 8 feet dug out and then I decided to work a bit on the bed between my yard and the neighbor's house.

I like my neighbor, very much in fact, but we have very different ideas of gardening. I am a no pesticides or herbicide kind of girl and I am happy to put in the work to weed a garden bed and to find more natural/organic ways to get rid of an infestation.

My neighbor is the opposite. If there is a chemical that will kill the inconvenience; IE, the weed or the bug, he will happily use it. We have a happy medium, he avoids spraying in my yard and I keep the fence-line as free of weeds as I can.

But, I have a section of bed that has a bad case of wild hyacinths.  I can't stand those things. You leave one little hunk of bulb and suddenly there is another batch of hyacinths!! I finally went all out on about 15 feet of fence-line next to where I plan on putting in the paver stones and pulled out and screened the soil to clear out as much of the hyacinths as I could. I ended up with about 2 yards of gravel as well. YAY!

I also cut back a Mock Orange that had gotten way out of hand. It was a good 20 feet tall and was no longer bushy. I really did cut it back hard and because the previous owner of this house who planted it here was not good at discerning how big plants grew... I might have to take it out. A Mock Orange has a 6 foot spread and it is right on the fence-line and my neighbor's pathway and house are only a couple of feet on the other side. The more I think of it the more I realize I need to dig it out... Ugh. I really hate digging out tree roots...

And just because it is spring, here is a gratuitous picture of my chickens looking happy in the sun.