I Have A Sickness

I made an appointment and drove all the way to town for the sole purpose of getting the Witch Hazel I wanted when I knew they would be in bloom. I was not going to be fooled by labels again. Meet the real 'Diane'.

Meet 'Jelena' too, 'Diane's' even frillier orange sister. No I did not want to return the Witch Hazel that was mislabeled and swap. I have a sickness. I want all three. Now where can I squeeze the two new ones into the garden?

That stack of rocks by the front steps never really excited me. It was not my best work. And my look at all those nice rocks that can be put to a better purpose. They were to close to resist.

Since I was going to be planting things I went ahead and transplanted one of the 'Gold Mop' chamaecyparis to a new location. It was to close to the Kousa Dogwood and would have been shaded out in time. The three chamaecyparis together were feeling crowded anyway. I moved the other one three feet up hill to space them a bit better.

Hale Mana could use a pair of breaching whales by the front entry. Much better.

'Diane' and the chamaecyparis were planted on the east side of the driveway below the path that leads to the sunny utility meadow. The 'Gold Mop' should make a nice backdrop for the red 'Diane'. I had to cut down three small dead hemlocks to make a bit more room. It's on my list to cut down all of the small dead hemlocks on the east side of the drive one day.

'Jelena ' joined 'Arnold's Promise', the faint yellow in the top right, in a shrub border that will frame and enclose the wild lawn one day.

I like 'Jelena'. She might be my favorite.

Once my sickness had been sated, I started toting rocks down to the new retaining wall. That one stack of rocks from the front entry made a big difference. I even got a very nice stepping stone for a bottom step out of that stack.

I'm also testing out using glass bottles to further reduce the needed rock hauling. Glass bottles will fill the gap where you see the space in the rocks and the section of bottles with the gap will be filled. The center section will be stone. If I don't like it I can always go fetch more rocks to replace the bottles.

Now I only need about six linear feet of rock and thirty or so wine bottles.

The new and improved path is coming along quite nicely.

It was a busy and productive day. There was no time to go look at the hundreds of snowdrops next door. Maybe tomorrow. I should make sure to see them before winter returns next week and they get buried in snow again.