A Little Curb Appeal

We (I) have had a lot of different projects planned for our new home (the garden being one of the smaller ones), and yesterday I finished the first major project: some back-breaking landscaping! No really, I'm sitting here confined to the couch with an ice pack because I was stupid and just had to finish it before another busy week started.

But it was worth it. I think.

After we moved in and the snow melted, I saw that this had been hiding under the snow bank next to our driveway:

Now, I don't really mind low-maintenance stone. But there were flagstones on top crumbling to pieces making it not very attractive, and some boring evergreen bushes in front of the porch, and I wanted pretty. Oh so pretty. So I quickly designed a little (ha) landscaping project: dig up the all the rocks (easy, right?) and plant a bunch of pretty border-type stuff.

I wanted plants that were native to Colorado, mostly so they'd be harder for me to kill but also because Colorado pride. So I started researching and came up with a list of perennial shrubs and flowers and groundcover that were either recommended for our dry/psycho weather region or had already proven at the old house that they could survive--at least a few years--under my neglect.

After deciding on the plants, I drew out the design I had in my head: the tallest plants by the steps, graduating in height down to the groundcover by the curb. I carried my silly but helpful little paper with me to the nursery, then posted it on the side of the fridge as motivation to start. In the end, I pretty much stuck to the original design with only a few minor adjustments.

The flora of choice, in order:

Carl Foerster's Feather Reed Grass

Sunset Hyssop

Russian Sage

Dianthus (Sweet William)

Blue Fescue Gass

Arizona Sun

Creeping Myrtle (I couldn't find any Frikart's Aster, and Creeping Myrtle had almost an identical purple flower color/profile, pluse a super awesome name).

Ice Plant (Delosperma, magenta)

Snow-In-Summer

Bugleweed






Next to the porch/boring evergreen bushes, I had already transplanted my Asian lily bulbs from the old house (they're actually sprouting! hooray!). They're a day-glo orange color, and between them I planted a magenta calla lily bulb (which remains to be seen) so I sort of stuck with this color scheme of magenta and orange with a mix yellows, adding in some lavender with the Russian Sage and Creeping Myrtle too.

I got a about a quarter of the digging done a few weeks ago before quitting because wheel barrels full of rocks are heavy and tip easily where they shouldn't (like into the entrance of the shed where they block the lawnmower and snow blower and take forever to clean up). When my motivation returned, Peter mentioned that the little red wagon might provide a little more stability. So that's what I did. All by my lonesome, start to finish, dig, pull, and dump 160 cubic feet of rock. All in one Saturday (with a little break for some crazy hail). To his credit, Peter was busy installing an opener on our third garage door so we wouldn't have to pull it up and down by hand anymore. No shorty-can't-jump complaints here...

Sunday afternoon I picked up the rest of the plants, replaced the landscaping fabric, set the border bricks, and finished digging and planting right after sunset (and right before the rain showed up--again. Seriously Colorado, what gives?!). It sounds much simpler than it was, of course. But little old me got er done.

There was still a tiny bit of light left...
at least they got a good drink!

And even though I woke up cringing and immobile, it makes me perfectly happy to look at. I'll be even happier to see it all in bloom in a few weeks.

So yes, definitely worth it I think. I think I'll even agree to my own HGTV contract when the network sees this and decides to call me up. Just as long as someone else does the heavy lifting...