Rolling along.......the battle of the weeds

Hello friends!
Short post today (well maybe..........).  I seem to have been really busy, even though we're staying home for the most part.  I really want to respect the social distancing at this time, and I may continue to do so for quite awhile.

This is what I've been doing.

Creating and making.
 (more on this in my next post) 
Illustration by Mary Engelbreit.

Digging up my Iris bulbs, separating and planting about 60 singles all over our yard!

This bed was so PACKED with Irises that it was like cement! 

Digging a new flower bed below our rock wall (for Iris bulbs).

Transplanting single bulbs and pruning down the leaves.

Buckets and buckets of Iris to plant... I still have many left and nowhere to put them.

The "newbies" even sent up new flowers! I was surprised.

Chopping up the white garden  hutch (darn... I left it out for two winters and it was just falling apart, so decided to take it to the dump).

BEFORE... falling apart and rotting wood. 

AFTER.......

Bye Bye hutch... sniff sniff..... a new one will be coming soon (hopefully).

Cleared out entire back yard "patio" area to ready it for new gravel.

Moving all our yard stuff, tables, chairs, planters, and junk tools to behind the house and on the back lawn (which needs mowing by the way).

Cleaning up weeds in our back "dirt" area (soon to "maybe"? be gravel?)...... it's the dirt area we tried to reseed twice last year, and the weeds took over again, so we are giving up on it! No lawn there... just gravel.

A right fine mess........ will we ever win the battle of the weeds?

Planting two new blackberry bushes..... thinning and transplanting my raspberries (they've LOVED the heavy rains).... and weeding flower beds. Note: the yellow Iris I bought last year is doing great!

(And yes, I do want blackberries! Where we lived in Washougal, WA (in the wet climate), blackberries grew wild everywhere. I loved having them! I made jam and pies galore. I really miss them here as there are none to be found. I'll keep them pruned to a reasonable size (hopefully).

Going to the gravel pit and ordering rock! Whoo Hoo! And having it delivered.

And this is what we WILL be doing - as soon as the rain quits!

Shoveling all of THIS stuff, by hand, into a wheelbarrow, and hauling it to our back yard - after we lay down the HEAVY tarps! Not looking foward to it.

We're hoping the gravel laying will start on Friday, the 22nd... we've been waiting a week for the rains to quit. We've had unseasonably high amounts of rain and "gully washer" type rains. 

We also need to get a new gutter by our back garage door, as when it rains so hard, our garage gets flooded! ...... which means more work, and more digging and cleanup around the back cement slab outside our garage. There is nowhere for water to drain that pours off of our roof. That's another story...........so we need to dig trenches before laying the gravel... maybe put in some drain pipe.... etc. etc. etc. 

With all the digging I've done, my neck has been killing me.. so hubby will have to do most of the gravel shoveling and hauling. I'll at least be there to supervise...... :-)

More to come on my crafty adventures! I've loved holing up in my craftroom (when I could)........... bye for now.

~Marilyn~