make a garden and landscape my yard better

And my mother wants my house to look more finished, more presentable, and even offered me money to help me complete the task.

Just this week I hired a retired biology teacher as a consultant on how to relandscape my yard. I’m on a corner so there’s a lot of area, and my goal is not to spend all my time gardening or watering. Plus I have a problem Monterey pine – it seems to be lifting up the foundation near the chimney, and that’s NOT a good thing.

We have a plan, more or less, and I just need to revise my request to the city to remove not one but all 3 trees in front, and replace them with at least 3 different ones. I’m trying to imagine the alternative of 3 birches vs. 1 persimmon or pomegranate on the corner. Either of these would work to provide summer shade and winter light, as the front of the house faces more or less NW, and gets lots of light in the summer.

And, I think I’m getting over my irrational thoughts that a more attractive front yard will attract too much unwanted attention to my house: this is about vulnerability to “bad guys”.

We’re also working toward painting the house. It’s currently dark red. I’m going for a cocoa with off-white combination, using deep purple (almost black) for an accent color (front door, porch supports, other?).

I did start a garden with much encouragement and help from my beau this past summer (2005). He designed and a colleague built raised redwood boxes with chicken wire on the bottom – I’ve since learned that a longer-lasting and better choice is welded wire 14 gauge (1”x1”) that will keep more critters out.

The tricky part is that my backyard abuts a creek and the night critters (raccoons mostly we suspect) had a feast on baby corn, beet greens (which meant that the beets didn’t grow bigger than a radish), and other treats.

We harvested a couple of squashes, quite a few Japanese eggplants, some tomatillos, not as many tomatoes as I expected, and some basil. The ornamental gourds blossomed nicely but never got fertilized. I learned from people more experienced than me that I can help the pollination process along using a feather to mix the pollen! Next year we’ll have completed the fence and hopefully will reap a bigger harvest.