idea for my blank slate back yard

[rainbowgardener]

This is a crude drawing of an idea I had for my backyard veggie garden:

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The green rectangles would be raised beds for veggies, just like the ones I built here. 16" tall, nicely finished.

The blue circle in the middle would be bird bath/ fountain.

The sort of arc/ semi- circles on the outside, shown in pink and blue, would be beds for flowers and herbs, all stuff to attract beneficial insects. They would be flat on the ground, or just slightly raised. So there would be height differences, to make up for the lot being so flat. Another kind of visual interest.

All the rest, the grey area inside the outer circle, would be mulched, so we wouldn't have to worry about mowing any of it.

My idea would be to strip all the sod off the whole circle. Build the raised beds, lay cardboard down on the bottom, fill them with all the stripped off sod, put more cardboard on top and then top soil on top of all that. Then cardboard down everything else and put mulch on top. If I do all that this fall, it should all be a lot broken down by spring and I can just add more soil, compost, etc to fill in the beds where it settled. We will have tons of cardboard available, since we will be moving all our possessions in cardboard boxes.

It's a 21 foot in diameter circle and the raised beds are 4x8' and they are to scale in the drawing (at least approximately ) There would just be a little edging for the outer circle, just to contain the mulch.

what do people think??

[imafan26]

Looks like a good plan.

[applestar]

Well... If you don't mind me nit-picking, I'm looking for the entrance to the central area....

...also, I keep wanting to make a recognizable shape out of this as if it's incomplete somehow? Does that make sense?

Um... I'm sort of wanting to make the pink shapes occupy the entire arc with the straight base extending the full (length + path + width)

I like that you are thinking 3 dimensionally with different heights. And I love the idea of birdbath/fountain in the middle.

[applestar]

I was playing around with your design.... I have a progression of where my imagery took me, but, rainbowgardener, I don't want to show you if you would feel like I'm taking your idea and running off with it. This is YOUR new garden. So I'll only post it if tell me if you want to see it.

...also, could you possibly add 3 feet more to the total area to 24 ft?

[rainbowgardener]

ummm ... yes, excellent point, applestar, about an entrance! Definitely have to work on that!!!

Maybe making the flower beds bigger.

Yeah, I always go for asymmetry, drives some people crazy...

Probably 24 feet, I just sort of made up the 21 feet, except of course that we aren't moved yet and I've only seen the place twice. The lot is 100' wide by 150' deep, but the depth includes front yard, house, pretty big deck, so I'm not quite sure if any of this is feasible until we get moved. It may have to be broken up more.

I'm just having fun dreaming up ideas, now.

But sure... I would LOVE to see your ideas, applestar.

[ElizabethB]

RBG - I saw this post yesterday and replied but managed to not post properly.

I LOVE your plan for a circular garden.

I think of you often. Your upcoming move has engaged us all. We have all tossed in our 2 cents. I looked at your original post and was nearly overwhelmed by the responses.

Like you my first instinct would be to get in the yard and I would want it to be perfect NOW. My unsolicited advice is to step back, take a deep breathe and really evaluate your priorities. Building your vegetable/herb garden and prepping it for spring planting would be a priority. I think your first focus should be your house. Unpack, organize. Paint and install shutters and window boxes. Leave the meat ball removal until spring unless they impede painting. If they do then rip them out. Having worked with old foundation plantings I would not put much faith in replanting.

I feel your excitement. I do worry about you over extending yourself. Take it easy. Take time to really evaluate your new environment. Get involved in your new community.

I am a little jealous. I would love to move because that would force G to get rid of the useless junk that he insists on hoarding.

When is your move date? I know it is soon.

I look forward to seeing pictures of the inside of your new home.

Go girl - just take it easy.

[applestar]

It's just doodling on the iPad (using Numbers)

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[rainbowgardener]

Thanks so much for sharing ideas, applestar and everyone!

Close on the house 8/14. First thing that will happen is that we are having the ugly pink carpet and some of the ugly linoleum with pink diamonds ripped out and hardwood flooring put down. That will take a couple days, so moving will start after that. Moving from Ohio to GA with all of our stuff, three vehicles and two pets is pretty much of a logistical challenge. I want to minimize the trips down, because each one is a 700+ mile round trip and costs money and we seem to be spending money these days like it is going out of style... It will take two trips for sure and may end up being three.

Yes, I can generate great ideas WAY faster than I can implement them. The list of things I want to do to our new house is very long... I just have to keep reminding myself it will be a work in progress for a long time. I think we bought it to give ourselves something to do in our retirement!

[imafan26]

I think the original plan could still work, but I do agree that an entrance would be nice. The plan is not to scale but if the pink beds are moved over a bit then it would create multiple entry points.

The other thing would be to plant the flower beds around the fountain instead.

You do have a lot of work to do on the house and it will take a while to make it your own. You just need to sit down and set up some priorities for what needs to get done first. You will still have a winter to get some things done in the house and you have moved into a new zone and the soil may be different which opens up the possibilities to plant some new things but you may have to change some of the things you did before because conditions are different and you will need to do some experimenting with that.

[ElizabethB]

RBG - pink carpet and pink diamond linoleum? Barf.

When we bought our home in 87 the fixtures in the hall bath were lime green - not avocado - lime. The entire house had gold shag carpet. Barf again. The bedrooms now have wood floors. The rest of the house is ceramic tile. No carpet.

The ceilings are popcorn. The wall were originally paneling. The previous home owners had the walls textured with popcorn. I hate the popcorn but it is too expensive to have it removed or to sheetrock over. We have repainted the walls and ceilings three times over the years.

I do not envy you the actual move. A logistical nightmare. I do envy your new start.

[Susan W]

Oh my, re-working inside and outside is major! I have a couple of suggestions for outside, FWIW.

Just suggesting it would be good to fix even a small garden area now, to be planted in spring. Raising the bed some will be good. It looks like your yard is flat, and with the rains, no place for water to drain. You won't be in a swamp, just a wet yard. Instead of planning the main area as you have sketched, can you put in a couple of rectangle beds (4 x 8, 4 x 12ish) along side of front or back yard? Use this space for veggies next spring, and in time can morph to perennial flower beds as you work your other major plan. Laying out the big back yard space perhaps should wait until you live through a season or 2.
Birdbaths are essential. Best to be near shrub, tall flowers etc for cover for birds. This needs to be in easy hose reach also for daily refreshing. Fountains are awesome. They do require power for pump and with the long hot summers get icky.

Just some thoughts!

[ElizabethB]

RBG - just checking to see how you are doing. The count down is on. Thinking of you and wishing you the best.

[rainbowgardener]

Oh yeah, count down is on! Starting next week, three weeks in a row we will take trips down to No. Georgia with some kind of truck/van AND a vehicle. At the end of all that presumably all of our stuff, three vehicles and two pets will be there.

I'll be very glad when all that is over and we can quit running up and down the road between OH and GA and just work on settling in!

[applestar]

Good luck!

[rainbowgardener]

So here is my gathering of pots to move to Chattanooga:

(They are lined up next to a raised bed, but obviously the raised bed stays!)

That isn't everything yet. A couple of the largest pots, with trees in them have yet to be moved.

We are going down tomorrow for the first trip with stuff. We will drive a cargo van and my car. Leave my car there and drive the cargo van back. The cargo van will have a little furniture and a bunch of boxes. I'm going to put as many of the planters as I can in my car.

All the smaller stuff, 12" diameter pots or less, stays. More replaceable.

[applestar]

Good luck! Wishing you safe travels.

[rainbowgardener]

My little Honda Civic is now loaded up with ten large pots full of plants, a bunch of saucers, a pot stand, my watering can, and the garden bunny (statue), ready for the drive tomorrow!

[pinksand]

Best of luck with your trip down!

[imafan26]

O.k. I don't go long distances, but I have to move my plants last since when they move they have to be watered and some of them don't make it just because of the stress of being in the car and a different environment. Are you moving all the plants in a couple of days or over a few weeks? How do you take care of the plants at one place or the other?

[ElizabethB]

RBG - best of luck on your move. Be safe. That is a long drive. As long as you water as soon as you reach your destination our plants will be fine.

My thoughts and prayers are with you and your partner as you transition to a new life.

Please keep us posted on your progress.

[rainbowgardener]

So we took the first small load of stuff down.

Here's some of my plants that got moved this trip (not where they will stay, just a convenient place to unload them to)

Along with plants, the first things that got moved are some books:

(and the easy chair and lamp for reading them!)

and some kitchen stuff and cookbooks:

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We drove down on Thurs and are back today. Next week the big move with the 20' van!

Oh and I did pace it out.... there is plenty of room in the back yard for my 24' in diameter circle garden, with plenty of room for other stuff (and the huge deck and the roomy shed). So that's my plan!

[applestar]

Yay! Circle Garden is a go! ...and sounds like the trip went well.
Good luck on your next trip, too.

Have you figured out where to put your seed starting/holiday gift craft station yet?

[rainbowgardener]

No.... not exactly. It's odd the new place (in terms of indoor, heated space) is almost as big as the old one, but feels a lot smaller. Just the way things are arranged. But it does have the shed and a generous two car garage, neither of which the Cincy place has; neither currently heated. I'm thinking that the seed starting area will have to be in one of those unheated spaces. Maybe eventually we can insulate the garage and make it nicer. For this winter, maybe just a space heater just on enough to keep everything from freezing. Maybe I can rig up some kind of enclosure inside the garage for the seed starting, so I don't have to heat the whole garage. Haven't got it all worked out. And I know winter won't be as bad as here, but I don't really know exactly what it will be feeling like.

We met more neighbors and we have been dealing with a lot of service people, for the utilities and the company who will be putting new hardwood floor down instead of the ugly old pink carpet that is there now. I have to say that thing about Southern hospitality, etc seems really true. Everyone is really friendly and welcoming and trusting. The flooring guys are proceeding to put down all that flooring without even asking us for a deposit or sign anything, just on a handshake.

[ElizabethB]

RBG - Welcome to the south.

So what is the latest? Looks like you got the real important stuff moved - plants, books, cook books and kitchen stuff. I have the same priorities. Have you made your second trip yet? I am extremely curious.

What are the winter lows in your new home? You may only need 100 watt light bulbs hanging near your seed shelves - maybe a space heater. You can make a mini green house with scrap lumber, 2" x 4"'s or PVC draped with visquine. If you have exposed rafters you can drape them with visquine. A 100 watt light bulb inside will be all you need.

Looking forward to hearing about your progress.

[rainbowgardener]

Well, I still have yet to do anything in the yard. Mainly working on getting ourselves "built in" to the house -everything unpacked and set up and shelves where we need them, etc-- and re-doing the old weathered deck.

before picture:

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during picture:

all the ugly plastic lattice is gone, the end section has been scrubbed, rinsed, puttied, sanded, rinsed, one coat of deck restore paint brushed on working it down well into all the cracks, etc., and a second coat rolled on. The next section has everything up through putty. Deck is 40' x 11' plus an 8 x 9 connector passage between deck and house, plus stairs, railings, etc.

But I did build this:

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Compost bin all built from found objects, pieces of the lattice and scrap wood that was lying around. Next to it is brush pile of tree trimmings I've been doing. Eventually will be run through the chipper/shredder and turned in to wood chips. Gotta have a compost pile!

In the background you can see some white fencing, that is the horse farm right behind us. I did talk to the horse farm owners this morning (when our dog managed to jump our fence and turn up in their yard!). They said I can have all the composted bedding/horse manure I want for my garden! I'm a country girl now!

[rainbowgardener]

Still not gardening much... Thinking about decor. The house is split level - three levels but not three stories. Upper level has three bedrooms and two baths. Main level where you come in has kitchen, dining area, living room. Lower level (under the bedrooms, partly below ground) has bedroom, bath and large family room, with a brick fire place wall.

So I have decided to decorate by seasons. The master bedroom will be fall: burgundy, brown, cream, gold, with black accents. It faces west with a large sliding glass door, so gets lots of golden afternoon light. Across the hall the two bedrooms, which face the morning light, will be spring: spring green, spring flower colors, gold and white. One of them is an office and will also have black accents (necessarily). The living room/dining area will be summer: deep green, dark summer sky blue, touches of red and gold. The family room will be fall again, but with more blues, teals. No winter ... we left winter behind! Gold will be unifying theme, gold accents with all the seasons.....

[rainbowgardener]

Still thinking about the gardens. I decided I might be able to literally think outside the box:

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I can't build these as boxes out of fence posts like I did before, but I think I could build them out of the interlocking concrete blocks. You can go around curves with those:


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Done this way, they would be too wide to reach into and I might have to put little paths inside the veggie beds....

The big circle is 24' diameter. Depending on how wide I make the paths, I think that makes the gardens 7 or 8' on a side.

[applestar]

That's going to look great! And the blocks would make a continuous bench to sit on and put container plants on.

Color schemes for the inside sounds really nice too... Though I like winter color scheme too (one of the bathrooms?)

[imafan26]

Keystone blocks come in a couple of sizes but would look great. All I remember about putting them in was that it was important to take the time with the first level to make sure they are straight and level. The other levels were quicker to put together after that.

It looks like you are refining your plan. It is a lot of work but it must be nice to have a blank slate to start from.

[rainbowgardener]

Yes, I have used the interlocking concrete blocks before. My previous location with the steep hillside in back, I built three retaining walls down the hill. I am very aware that doing a good job of digging the first layer in and getting it completely level is key to the whole thing. That part is a lot of work, but after that it is just stacking blocks and is easy and fun.

Yes, I have never started with a blank slate like this. It is fun! It is a good thing that moving in and unpacking is making me slow down on the yard work and take the time to keep thinking and refining. Now I am getting eager to get started. But it is also just as well I haven't planted anything yet. This area seems to be in drought also. In the month we have been here, we have had near zero rainfall. Should have been 3-4" by historical averages. Anything I planted, I would have had to be watering like crazy.

The drought monitor map (https://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/) shows us on the edge of "abnormally dry" areas, but not exactly in it and "abnormally dry" is their least severe category. But it feels like drought to me. It has been nice in a way, one day after another of beautiful, sunny days with clear blue skies and low humidity. But everything is drying up. When I rake the lawn (for leaves and grass clippings for the compost pile), lots of dust comes up.

[rainbowgardener]

So here's what the deck is looking like now:

that's one half. We moved the furniture on to the painted half and now we are working on the other half. (compare to the before picture on previous page!)

The chairs were just on the end drying in the sun, after being washed. We will put a plant bench and trellis across the end of the deck, like we had at the old house, to screen the view of the neighbors.

Here's a view from the deck:

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(click to enlarge)

I like that picture because, along with the horse, it shows our dogs and the compost bin I built and a bucket next to it, showing the bin is in active use....

[applestar]

LOL the back of that little white dog standing up looking at the horse next door just speaks volumes!

[rainbowgardener]

Yeah, Shibu, the brown dog, didn't happen to be doing it at that moment, but both the dogs spend a lot of time just fascinated watching the horses. The little white one (who doesn't actually belong to us), barks at them like crazy, but our dog just watches.

[rainbowgardener]

Just to try my hand at this picture combining thing, I made this, the before and after of that end of the deck:

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[pinksand]

That is such an improvement! You did a beautiful job

I'm sure it's been an adventure for your dog as well! So many new sights and sounds and no way to really explain that this is where you'll be living from now on.

[imafan26]

It looks fantastic. What a transformation.

[rainbowgardener]

So here is the very beginning of laying out the 24' diameter circle and starting to clear it:

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Good time to be digging, all the rain last week softened the ground.

I don't know if you can tell, but a lot of the right side of the circle is kind of sunken, where an above ground pool used to sit. So I want to strip some of the sod off the left side and pile it on the right to level a bit. The very beginning of that is the brown stuff on the right side. The soil is not as bad as I expected, not as hard clay as I was used to. A bit heavy and clay-ish, but not like you could just dig it up and make pots.

This photo, taken from near the other end of the yard, gives the overview a bit. You can just see where the circle will be, by the arc of dirt showing at the back of the pic.

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So it sort of shows the placement of the circle between deck and shed at the sunniest end of the yard.

There's still plenty of yard left for other stuff! In the other corner from the compost pile, I want to put some pavers, a gazebo/ seating area, fire pit, and eventually a little pond/ water feature next to it. And around the edges some trees, shrubbery, tall grasses, mixed hedgerow kind of thing.

[applestar]

Looking forward to watching your new garden take shape and start to grow little bits of compost Browns are on the ground already, I see. What kind of trees are already growing on and around your property?

I like the ideas you mentioned for the " living " areas.

[rainbowgardener]

As you can see if you look at the leaves in enlarged view, it is mostly oak -- a couple huge old oak trees. They are rooted in the neighbor's yard, but hang over into mine. Not sure what kind of oak, but they have teeny tiny acorns, much smaller than the ones I am used to seeing. Our lawn is full of hundreds of them. Or maybe they are dropping baby acorns prematurely?

[rainbowgardener]

There is a big old tree on the other side, over by the compost pile that I haven't id'd yet.

In the meantime, peeling the sod back turns out to be an effective way to find (and be able to get rid of) the Japanese beetle grubs. I got a maybe 4 sq foot area done today (we are still painting the deck!) and found 6 grubs. I don't know if that is a huge amount or not. But now there are 6 less grubs in my lawn!

So if there are grubs I miss, but they are under sod and cardboard and mulch or sod and cardboard and an 18" high raised bed, will the grubs still be able to surface in spring?