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Monday, September 23, 2013

Tackling The Garden ... A Weed At A Time

We had a break from the rain last weekend and managed to spend a couple of hours in the Spring sunshine pulling weeds and transplanting some plants and trying to tidy up the garden ready for some entertaining now that the warmer weather is just around the corner.
 
This time last year my garden was looking pretty good the lawn was growing well and the vegetables and herbs were being harvested. Now another season gone and the garden is looking a lot more worse for wear now that we have little Lexi our backyard destroyer who has turned the lawn and garden beds into her very own digging playground!
 
There were 2 palms underneath the French Doors so they needed to be moved so we can put some steps near the French Doors so we can start using them to access the backyard. Eventually there will be a deck along the back there, but until then we are going to build some temporary steps or something as I'm absolutely hanging out to use the French Doors!
 
Digging up the palms to transplant them
 
These poor palms have held up pretty good the last few years with us clambering around on top of them when we were renovating the bathroom and replacing the window to the right and when we turned the window into a doorway they are both kind of smack bang in the middle and got a bit of a beating with ladders and people!
 
Moving the palms out of the way
 
If that didn't kill it, I don't think anything will! The trunks have been growing side ways as well so instead of them standing tall they look like little dwarf palms. Coming from a vertically challenged person, I don't mind their shortness, good things come in small packages after all :)
 
The 2 palms ready to go into their new home
 
Once they were put into the ground and given a good water they look pretty happy in their new home. This garden bed is at the back of the granny flat so gets lots of morning sun and afternoon shade so that should keep the plants pretty happy. This use to be a vegetable garden but after the crops died down and with Lexi still wanting to dig up any patch of sand she can get her paws into, we have now made this garden our bed for plants that we are growing to transplant to the front garden once the courtyard is built (like the Yukkas we are growing from cuttings).
 
No Lexi you can't help dig the holes ... sorry pooch!
We transplanted the lemon tree which has not given me any lemons in the 2+ years I've had it so finally let it break free from it's pot and planted it into the ground, in the corner by the back fence garden. It has started to show flowers which is a good sign of fruit coming .... I would use lemons so much in cooking, baking and drinking Bacardi and lemon is my favourite beverage and would love it if my lemon tree started to product lemons by the bucket load!
 
This is how it looked back in 2011 when I first bought it home and planted it into a pot
 
Now 2 years on it's outgrown it's pot

Mr P transplanting the lemon tree into the ground

 
Grow my pretty lemons GROW!
 
Showing before photos of all the weeds in the garden feels like I'm showing you my overflowing washing basket or pile of dishes ... I feel guilty for letting the garden get so unruly over Winter but honestly, it's so easy to forget about it when it's freezing cold and wet outside whose going to sit out there and weed? Not me!
 
BEFORE - Weeds along back fence garden and around the tree garden
 
AFTER - Weeds be gone!
 
The back fence garden got a long overdue weeding so you can actually see the limestone garden edging and dietes. They were a little lost in the weeds before! This was Mr P's job to do.
 
Mr P getting lost in the weeds!
 
Great job babe, you can see the plants again!
 
Meanwhile I tackled the around the tree garden trying to pull weeds out from amongst the flowers was not fun it was so fiddly and I had bees to dodge as well! I'm really not an outdoorsy person ;)
 
Around the tree garden full of weeds
 
A little better now !
 
Hopefully once we get some more sunshine we can spend a bit more time in the garden in the coming weeks to get it looking nice for Christmas and Summer entertaining. We are thinking about laying some more lawn, as the summer heat and then Lexi totally destroyed the last lot we laid. But not sure if Lexi is quite out of her destroying stage yet and it might be a waste of time and money to do so ... we will have to wait and see. 
 
How has your garden been growing lately?
Hopefully it's not full of weeds like mine!
 
 
[All images my own]
 
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10 comments:

  1. It's coming along great Michelle! big pat on the back for both or you!

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  2. So exciting! Coming along so well! :)

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  3. Well done, your garden looks great!!
    We've just put our house up for sale, so just trying to maintain the garden and making it look neat until the house sells...but with the wet weather we've had in Melbourne lately, gardening hasn't been much fun!

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    1. It's getting there, I know this summer is going to kill what is left of our lawn though :( Yes its very hard to get into the gardening spirit when its wet and wild weather, hopefully we get some more sunny weekends now we are well into Spring :)

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  4. I like the idea of working in the yard and making it pretty. I hate actually doing it! We've decided that this year when it's time to start cutting everything back to prepare for winter we are hiring someone to do it. I'll enjoy that much more =)

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    1. Haha me to! I spend most of the time snapping the tops off the weeds rather than actually pulling them out.

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  5. I can see it all starting to come together. I wonder if Lexi will leave the new plants alone or consider them a new toy? Friends of ours had to replace all of their sprinklers three times till their dog grew out of the puppy stage.

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    1. Surprisingly she has left them alone so far but Im not brave enough to put out my new set of solar lights as she chewed all 20 of the last ones to bits 1 by 1 ... lucky for her she's so cute!

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