Weekend Gardener

One of my first impressions of living at the lake full time would be that weekends would disappear. Life would become one long weekend. So far, that hasn't happened. And I think it won't ever - because other people still have weekends - like our kids. Matt was here for this weekend and it's been great having each of our two kids on our own for their first visit to the new cottage "home".

Also, while I am still doing "work work", some things still need weekends - like gardening. It's amazing how many hooker/bloggers are also gardeners. I was inspired by many of my blogger friends who shared pictures of their horticultural works of art, so I am too.

With this warm weather, it's incredible how far ahead everything is here. And it makes me feel even further behind. I have a special perennial garden on the road side of the cottage that is mostly visible from inside the cottage (see, I still call it "cottage" - gotta get over that.) I call it my secret garden. Here's a picture so you can see how huge these plants are. This perspective doesn't show height - those  centre ones are already over five feet - normally this early they would be less than half this size.

On the lake side, there is a garden that has been evolving for the 18 years we have been coming here. Since the trees have gotten so much larger, the light has changed and the plants along with it.  Plants that thrived when the big pine was small have now disappeared. But it's still a wonderful place to spend hours weeding and tending, and this is the view from the deck.

Since I am an "accidental gardener" it is always a work in progress and I need to add, move and reinvent on a continual basis. But it's such good therapy. And besides, how would the bugs get their pound of flesh if I didn't spend time out there?

This year we also had to figure out what to do with our planters from the city. Because we were only here on weekends before, and not able to water regularly, we didn't bother with planters on the deck. I didn't want to re-create what we did there, so I came up with a new scheme for here. A little red-white-red idea evolved and we have three rectangular planters and one square one that share this planting.

And my son insisted on some herbs, so we did one pot of the usual suspects and the empty- looking one has green onion bulbs inside. These are definitely an experiment - since we've not done bulbs before. I've already used some of the basil in a salad and this should be a wonderful resource. The rosemary plant was so huge when we bought it that I anticipate having to trim it for Christmas.

I spent a couple of hours fighting with some grass in the black-eyed susan garden closest to the water, but will wait until the bruising subsides before I share any pictures. Anyone who doesn't think that gardening is a great workout should pull out grass for two hours. Yikes.

So here's to keeping weekends - a special time to spend doing things that you can't get to during the week, like gardening. And for having your loved ones visiting and helping you get those things done.