Garden Update Part I

So the clothesline picture was not the greatest shot in the world of the clothesline (it was hot and I was lazy...and a little worried about finding another yellow jacket!). So I thought I would tell you why there is a mountain in the driveway. My brother, Remarkable Robert, is a tree surgeon. He denies that and says he is really a tree mortician. Either way, he works with trees. He cuts down the dead ones, he trims off damaged branches, he gets them off houses and roads and cars when they fall down, etc. He has a very busy business. Every few days he winds up with a dump truck load of wood chips. Marvelous Mark suddenly had a thought one day and asked Remarkable if he could have a dump truck load of these chips. A chance to get rid of a load? Sure!!


So one day the truck made the climb up the street and voila! a load of wood chips in the driveway. This shot shows a diminished mountain, because the guys have been busy and taken care of about half of it already. Marvelous got busy (so did Dashing Dan) and started spreading them around the garden for mulch. Since our soil is not the best, this has been terrific. Instant compost!


Then Marvelous started thinking about how much he does not enjoy mowing and edging and weed-eating in the hot Alabama sun. Then he started thinking about how the grass is not doing too great in parts of our clay-y front yard and how much it was going to cost if we had to get a load of top-soil and grass seed or (worse yet) sod. So he and Dan started spreading the compost along the front sidewalk


and the grass-less parts of the front yard.


The master plan is that we will eventually have flower beds where there is now mulch (although I am really hoping for a vineyard) and that the mower will be used for a small bit of grass in the front and under the clothesline in the back. Hurrah for wood chips! Yippee for Remarkable Robert!! Scuppernongs, here we come!