Everything dead (almost).. this was taken about 3 weeks ago. Our back "lawn" was ruined by the winter snows and cold.
Below is our "gravel" area where we had our patio set and flowers last year. Looks more like mud now.. the gravel has sunk into the ground, never to be seen again I fear!
The weeds are doing very well thank you. And the ladder is there when we had to get our kitty cat down from the roof...... you'll see why later in this post.
At least the weeds are growing now! Is that a good sign? also one little pot of pansies shows some promise.
Pretty sad from 3 weeks ago (below).
Dead or lying dormant Vinca Minor (I think)..... those vines below..... in my rock garden that is no longer there (see why further down post).
Our "patio" area is one giant mess! (below). At least there's some green now.
Everything grows in the gravel! (grumble grumble)
And now.................. for the not so fun news.......... we lost our big front yard tree in the April 7th HUGE windstorm all around most of Oregon. Although it had died, it was beautiful in its own way, and I really liked it... and it still gave wonderful shade to the front of our house in the hot summer. Goodbye tree.
It hit the power lines.... the power company came and cut just enough out so it would drop to the ground.............then left!
Look at that pretty silver/blond bark. It was SO pretty! A guy was driving the neighborhood looking for downed trees I'm sure, and offered to cut it up and remove it for the wood. We let him. Easy peasy (above).
The root ball tipped and totally trashed my rock garden... also caused a huge crack in our rock wall to the side. The guy didn't get the root ball. We have to deal with it ourselves.
Cracked wall (below).......... plus it was pushed out and in doing that, it pushed out the rock wall along the front of our house, that was cracked a little bit, but now there is a huge crack in it! Not happy.
Good news though, our Homeowner's Insurance will cover the repair, less $500 deductible of course, but at least will pay for some of it and removal of the big root ball and stump.
Even though my yard is very sad, there are a few good things happening, although very slowly....... we're not getting much sunshine these days, but despite that, Mother Nature is performing her magic.
 |
| Grape Hyacinths popping up all over. |
 |
| Spider Wort in the foreground, more grape hyacinths and my vine maple tree that I brought with me from Washougal, WA 5 years ago, has survived. |
 |
| My raspberries that I also brought with me from Washougal, WA are doing very well. Lots of new babies are appearing. There's our kitty Rudy on the right. He loves playing in the tall grass (that needs mowing). Oh hubby, where are you???? |
 |
| Tons of shasta daisies are raising their cold and wet heads....... amongst all the dead growth from last year, that I just HAVE to get out and cut down. One of these days.............. |
 |
| The grape hyacinths are so cute... but the tall weeds love them too much. |
 |
| One lone tulip in our back flower bed. We never planted it. Someone did... thank you "someone". |
 |
| Did I spy some Delphiniums? Yes! |
 |
| Did I spy another Holly Hock in our back flower bed? Yes! |
 |
| Oh good! some strawberries survived the winter! Love..... |
A couple of more things............. my rock garden in the front yard is kapoot... the lilac bush survived but just barely... need to transplant that, but it's awfully big. I want to try to save it as our yard is so devoid of color. I think we're going to remove that entire rock area so that I can walk from the side of the house right onto the front lawn, without having to climb a big step, and then go down 2 steps (and back and forth, back and forth) to drag the hose out to the front to water. Now that the tree is gone..........................
We scored a couple of neat garden/yard pieces from a neighbor lady who was moving. Got a big old wood kitchen hutch.......... going to paint it of course. What color says she? Will be perfect for a potting bench outside!
 |
| The top part is shoved forward, because after we lost the big tree, our older cat got up on the roof a few times, and then couldn't get back down because the tree was gone! All our cats were used to climbing that tree and jumping onto the roof, and then getting down by jumping over to the tree and climbing down. The two youngsters figured out how to jump down onto the fence, but our older girl was stuck...... I tried shoving that top of the hutch to the front and urged her to jump there, or onto our patio table (to the left) but she wouldn't.... finally had to get the ladder out (in previous photos) and hubby had to climb up and get her. This happened many times until she has finally figured it out! |
 |
| And surprise surprise, this hutch has two of those big metal bins that were used I'm sure for flour and sugar at one time. They will be perfect for my potting soils! |
Also got a pretty wood garden bench in fairly good shape. Just needs a coat of paint.
 |
| That big mess of weeds and grass clippings that is in the sunken down area with cement surround, is our future pond (I hope)............... hubby?... are you there? I have a TO DO list. |
