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rainbowgardener
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Re: landscape consultation

That $30,000 difference is what is going to allow us to put solar panels on. We just sold our Cincinnati house (which has been on a two year lease to own). This house is enough cheaper than the Cincinnati house (which was almost paid off) that the sale price allows us to pay off the mortgage on this house completely, pay off the loan on our truck, AND have enough left over to do solar panels.

We just signed a contract for the solar panels which will be operational before the end of the year!! :D

It is an all electric house, so the solar panels will wipe out most of our utility bills as well as giving us a very low carbon footprint.

This is the way to be retired: no mortgage, no debts, minimal utility bills, grow a lot of our own food. We retired with not very much cash and fixed income, but we have made it so we need very little money.

Just a note on how we did this, never having made a ton of money by middle America standards. When we bought the Cincinnati house, we bought a house that cost half of how much the bank said they would loan us. It also wasn't everything we wanted - prettier than this one and with a nice big separate dining room, but very little gardening space and right on a big busy street. We bought it on a 30 year mortgage, but after two years, we refinanced to 15 year mortgage. And then we paid an extra thousand directly on the principal once a year. That is why that mortgage had only $2000 left on it when it was sold and why we came out with enough cash left over to do all those things above. The 15 year mortgage payments weren't that much higher than the 30 year ones had been and saved us thousands in interest. I really recommend it, if there is any way you can do it.

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rainbowgardener
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So I ordered myself a hundred dollars worth of shrubs for the front yard:
front yard plan with plants.JPG

If you click to enlarge, you can read the labels. Since the frontage I am planting is 55' across there's a lot more room than this looks like. I still want a couple of leucothoe/fetterbush and one or two purple nine bark.

Yes I know Japanese maple isn't native, but I just love them :shock: had a beautiful one in Cincinnati. It will be a dwarf.

You can see there's lots of berries for the birds, and four seasons of interest -- spring flowers, summer flowers, purple/ red foliage plants, broad leaf evergreens, fall colors, berries that last most of the winter....

Next year I will probably add a few more shrubs, an ornamental grass or two, maybe a small conifer type evergreen, and some perennials in front of them, with low annuals in front of them...

To get that many plants for that price (actually the Jap. maple isn't included in that price, haven't ordered it yet), they are in one gallon containers and are small. It will take it a couple years to look like much at all, but eventually it will be nice.

The berm will be a next year project...

Here's a couple of my inspiration pictures, the kind of thing I am eventually aiming for:
front yard landscaping.jpg
front yard landscape ideas 2.jpg

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applestar
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Oooh maybe you could get what I have been wanting for a while -- Italian pine that produces pine nuts. That would take a while I suppose.

Here it's too cold, I would have to go with dwarf Korean or Siberian... (native pines are too big), and I haven't gone ahead with getting any because my subsoil clay plus low soggy area being only available space left is likely not the right kind of soil for them. But especially with your planned berm, you would have the drainage you would need to grow pine.

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Yayyyyy It's looking great and I love your plan! I think painting the house a lighter, color will definitely add curb appeal, along with adding shutters.

I think what you have sketched out seems like sufficient space to be in scale with the house... obviously not if you planted a million little begonias in there, but I know you better than that.

I know you didn't necessarily want plant suggestions, but if you have the space for it on the far right of the house, a 'Little Gem' Magnolia would be beautiful there to soften the edge of the house. The aroma from the blooms could fill the rooms in the front if you open the windows. I have a great view of mine from our kitchen, but it's too far away to be able to appreciate the smell as much as I'd like. Just a thought!

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rainbowgardener
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Well, I was thinking some kind of taller tree at the corner to soften it. But we were out figuring out where the shrubs will go. Turns out I didn't entirely account for roof overhangs AND electric wires coming into the house. You can't see it in the picture, but all the main electrical wires come from the street to the corner of the house just in front of the chimney. The partner is very concerned about having anything near there that might possibly grow up into those wires (more concerned than I would be, my feeling is you just prune it away, but I have to listen to her). So we are going to have a small shrub on that corner instead.

And the barn shaped part of the roof has a wide overhang, so nothing can be planted very close or it will be in the rain shadow. So the bed will be a bit wider than I originally thought with at least two feet of gravel at the back.

Pictures to follow when I get planting done!

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pinksand
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Love it! Somehow I missed the second page of your thread when I posted... oops!

Your plant selections look great! The only thing that may be missing is greenery in the winter besides the Florida Anise. I know beautyberry is always advertised as having berries for winter interest, but mine is usually bare by December, leaving nothing but sticks Jan - April. The right side of the house will be stunning in the fall between the purple berries, blueberry leaves, and sweetspire, but I worry it might look a bit bare in winter. The leucothoe you mentioned might help a bit, being evergreen but is a pretty low grower, so not adding much structure.

Just wanted to point it out since that's one of the differences I noticed between what you've mentioned already purchasing and what I see in your inspiration photos. I know it's not native, but what about a camellia in between the windows? It looks like they have one in your first inspiration photo and it can offer either early winter or early spring blooms when nothing else is really blooming in your garden. If you want to stick native, maybe some kind of mountain laurel (not sure if they do well where you are) or holly like inkberry holly that could be a green backdrop for everything else?

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rainbowgardener
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I do want more evergreens. The leucothoes will help, but as you say not very big. In the meantime, I just bought a prostrate juniper and an evergreen re-blooming azalea, neither of which is native, but oh well. I want mostly native plantings and things with habitat value, but I'm not being 100% purist. There are native azaleas here, but they are all deciduous. I wanted the evergreen one.

I definitely want a camellia, just not sure where yet.... That spot between the windows is where I was going to put the beautyberry. They say 3-5', but the one I had in Cincinnati got gigantic and incredibly fast growing. I ended up cutting it back to just about two feet tall at the end of the season and I would still have to cut it back again mid-season to keep it in bounds. When I didn't do that, it would get to 10' tall in no time. So I thought I would give it a little more room this time.... But I could re-think that. :D They have camellias in the stores right now; I was looking at them longingly....

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pinksand
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Yeah, it's so hard to stick to only native, especially when looking for something evergreen. My motto is if I can find something native that fits what I'm looking for I'll definitely go with it, otherwise if it has any environmental value it gets points, and if it has negative environmental impact then it's out. The re-blooming azaleas are gorgeous, and the bees will enjoy their blooms O:)

10' tall is a huge beauty berry! That sounds stunning!!!

You'll have more camellia options where you are than I have here! I have Winter's Snowman which is supposed to bloom in late fall and consistently buds and then gets zapped by frost. It's only been in the ground for 2 years so it's more established this year and looking really good with lots of fat healthy buds so I'm hoping I'll get to finally enjoy it! My 'April Rose' camellia has only been in the ground for a year and was absolutely stunning last March, blooming for a solid month. If you have the chance to get one, I say go for it! They're great for a space where you want height but don't have the width for something huge.

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rainbowgardener
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So, pinksand, I took your suggestion! :) Ran right out and bought myself a camellia!! Thanks for the idea.

Still working on getting all this planting done. Bought some bags of organic enriched topsoil and some peat moss and dug out some buckets of compost. Spreading all that around and turning it in and planting.

In the meantime, the crew is here installing our solar panels, so lot is happening! :)

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Don’t forget tea is camellia, too. Camellia sinensis var. sinensis :wink:

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pinksand
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You have a LOT going on at once! How exciting! I'll look forward to hearing how you like your solar panels. It's something I've considered, but also really want the Tesla shingles since our roof needs replacing soon... just nervous about something so new and expensive!

What variety of camellia did you end up with? I don't think you'll be disappointed!

Yayyyy, it's all coming together!

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rainbowgardener
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Yes the Tesla shingles and the Tesla power wall are very new and expensive technologies yet. Our system can be retrofitted to a power wall later. In a few years, I expect that the price on them will have come down a whole lot. In the meantime, we've spent all the thousands of dollars we can for right now. (Incidentally, come tax time we will get a 30% rebate on our system; that is substantial.)
solar panels.jpg
solar crew.jpg

The camellia is variety Yuletide. And yes, the fact that it is tea leaves was another thing making me want it.

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The panels are all on! From most angles from the ground, you can't even see them:
solar panels on roof.jpg
Both directions of roof there have panels. You can just see the edge of the ones on the section of roof to the right of the door.

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So here's the first pictures of the plantings. The pictures aren't very good -- I need to take some earlier in the day, when the shadows aren't on them. The house faces (mostly) east, so it is a morning sun location.

Looking from the driveway, the first ones are florida anise, prostrate juniper, summer sweet. (It's just a flat of pansies that I am planning to pop in various places. ) I have a battery operated, self winding hose caddy ordered, to keep the hose neat and hidden.
florida anise.jpg
Looking from the other direction, in the foreground is the re-blooming azalea, farther back is the camellia and blueberries. Not visible in front of this picture, off the corner of the house is a sweetspire, which is sort of visible at the very end of the first picture, near the neighbor's driveway.
azalea.jpg
This is another view of camellia and blueberries. Not visible off the left edge of this photo, near the end of the porch is a beautyberry. The beautyberry is barely visible in the first picture, near the big white bag of peat moss.
camellia.jpg
In the front corner of the lawn, in front of the utility box, etc is a serviceberry tree and a dogwood tree. This is where I had thought about putting a raised berm. Maybe in the spring I will lift the trees and do that. Or maybe it will just become an island bed instead.
serviceberry.jpg
Next step is to put down a bunch of mulch, with gravel next to the house. And the stairs from the front door still need to be built, then paths added. In the spring I will add the leucothoes and probably a purple nine bark and then a bunch of perennial and annual flowers. Everything is tiny so far. In a couple seasons, it will have grown and filled in a lot. These pictures seem to condense the distances; there's a lot more room and things are farther away from the house than it looks like.

After everything is settled in a bit, I will check the soil pH. Most of these are acid lovers. My soil is slightly acid to start with. I planted them with some peat moss and a little bit of Dr. Earth organic fertilizer for acidity. So I will need to check where it ended up at, to see what else I need to do.

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pinksand
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RBG it's looking beautiful!!!! It's hard when everything is so tiny at first, but I can envision what all those plants will look like in a few years as they start to really take off. It's going to be such an improvement! I love the variety you have going on in there.

Off topic, but my Winter's Snowman is officially blooming for the first time!!! I think our conversation about them brought me good luck.

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@Rainbowgardener: Just by reading through this thread I got a lot of useful information. Thank you for sharing details about your affording a house, going low cost with utilities and new plans ;) . You went 100% solar or you are still connected to the grid? The installation looks very clean and neat.

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It is connected to the grid. In fact we are not powering our own house, we are just contributing power to the grid. (Officially we are now a green power provider.) I was a little disappointed when I realized this. Eventually we may change it. Our system can be retrofitted to something like a Tesla power wall (lithium battery power storage). In a few years, I expect that the price on them will have come down a whole lot. In the meantime, we've spent all the thousands of dollars we can for right now.

But we actually make more money from them this way. Connected to the grid, the utility company pays us for all the power we generate, even that which is in excess of what we use. With battery storage, we are essentially only benefiting from what we use.

It is very clean and neat and only visible from certain angles.

Again it depends on our usage and what happens to energy prices, but the guy from the utility company gave us an estimate of 7 year payback time, for when we will have made our money back from them. That is even less than we were expecting and the utility company is completely separate from the solar company, so he wasn't hyping a product.

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Oh, 7 years payback time is wonderful! Lately, I read a lot about solar power and different schemes and options available. That's why I asked you about being connected to the grid.

So, you go with "Solar Renewable Energy Credits?" I liked how they are explained in the article from Greentumble on advantages of solar power (https://greentumble.com/solar-energy-pros-and-cons/). That is where I started to do my reading and then got more in depth.

But overall, I am very much convinced that modern solar panels are definitely worth it. And I am sure that efficient (and affordable) energy storage systems will be developed in the next decade, as more and more scientists and engineers set their focus on this task.

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So here's the next step in our home improvement projects:
new steps.jpg
new steps 2.jpg
(literally the next steps! :D )

remember, this is what it looked like when we started:
chattanooga house.jpg
chattanooga house.jpg (28.27 KiB) Viewed 10526 times
for some reason, of all the pictures I have of my house and yard, I never took one straight on of the house front, before we started making all the changes.

So now we will make the paver paths to the driveway and then do some re-painting.

Yes, I know, I always tell people go big with foundation plantings, has to be in scale with the house. Now I have teeny-tiny little shrubs, all out of scale. But give them a couple years! With everything else we are doing, just didn't have the pocket book to buy mature shrubs.

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The changes you made are really making a difference. I was going to say you could compensate with annuals to fill in while you wait for the shrubs to grow, but then thought maybe with the mild winters and longer growing season, they might grow faster than I (and maybe you, too) would expect.

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rainbowgardener
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In the spring I will plant flowers, perennials and annuals.

Here's one attempt at thinking about paint colors. I couldn't get a good paver color. The pavers will definitely not stand out in the landscape like that, basically some kind of brick/ terra cotta color:
house color.jpg
(I'm just learning to use the paint tools and I was going fast....

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rainbowgardener
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OR:
house colors 3.jpg

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New steps copy.jpg
.....

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rainbowgardener
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Wow, you are way better at the photo stuff than I am! I would have no idea how to put the bricks and flowers and everything in. I like the two tone door.

The one I did with the two extremely crudely indicated paver paths, the idea is the one closer to the house is where we park and the one farther back would be where guests park. The triangle in between would have a fountain or bird bath or something and a small shrub.

As I look at it in the picture and IRL, I think the yard is going to be a bit unbalanced with two paths going to the driveway and nothing the other way. There is no symmetry to the house anyway, but still... I'm thinking eventually we might need to add a path curving away from the driveway out to the street. It would be purely for cosmetics to balance the look better. There is no sidewalk and no one much walks on our little dead end street, except our neighbors walking dogs. Even the mail carrier drives up. Our guests would always be coming from the driveway.

I came here to post my latest attempt:
house colors 4.jpg
This has the garage doors painted the same color as the wood on the other side (below the barn roof) to blend them in better, so garage doors don't jump out at you so much

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rainbowgardener
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So I posted to my Facebook friends a poll, vote for the one that is my first Dec 1 post here with the blue shutters or the second Dec 1 post with the red shutters. I personally actually favor the blue (but with the darker garage doors as in the red-shutter picture), but every vote so far (five of them) has been for the red shutter version.

Anyone here want to register a vote? :D

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New steps copy2.jpg
...

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rainbowgardener
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beautiful! I love all the "plantings"! Hope mine looks something like that, some day.

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I like the darker garage doors. Generally I think garages and driveways and cars are a necessary eyesore on a house and garden. Painting them darker mitigates that.

I like the blue shutters and taupe ex. walls. Dark red fades more quickly than any other paint I've seen. Also, blue on the door would be more visible than the dark red if you continue to use a screen door or glass storm door.

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rainbowgardener
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Yay!! A vote for blue! :D

Yes, I quite like the darker garage doors and will do that, no matter what color we paint the door and shutters (the shutters are still only hypothetical/ virtual). I also think in this case making the garage doors match the wood on the other side (below the barn roof), will add some balance to our entirely asymmetrical house.

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Taupe R copy2.jpg

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rainbowgardener
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Very nice! One of my off-line friends just suggested slate color ....

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OK gardener friends. Help me think again.... Still just working on laying out pavers. Eventually it will be two of the 16x16" pavers wide with a row of the small multi colored bricks as edging down each side. As currently constituted, it comes basically straight out from the driveway much of the time and then curves around to the steps. My question is would it be more esthetic to keep the curve from the steps going more, so the path would be closer to a semi-circle and end up meeting the driveway a little closer to the house? (Following the curve of the plantings more... though the plantings can be added to/ re-arranged in the spring) The pavers aren't set in at all right now, while we figure out how we want them.

Image

Image

Image

(let me know if there's any trouble seeing the photos. I just copied the image address straight from Facebook, without downloading them to my computer first. I don't know if that will be a problem for people who don't use FB. )

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My thinking on this is that the full arc or quarter circle is a little more likely to be obeyed by delivery and visitors, whereas the smaller radius arc only at the right angle will sometimes be cut short, trampling stuff in your bed.

But, the full arc could leave you with an acute angle if you adhere to the geometry. So a bit of a straight path coming onto the lawn from the drive, then a more gradual arc (longer radius) to the base of the steps.

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so.... spent the past four days painting our house. Not done yet, but mostly.

Here's what the house originally looked like:
Image

here's what the front looks like now:
Image

trim around the door and the stair treads are yet to be painted. Still to come: put shutters on the upper windows on right, paint door to match shutters in some accent color, maybe dark red, add window boxes to lower right windows. Somehow the pictures don't quite do it justice, but we have made major changes in the curb appeal of the house. We aren't planning to sell it any time soon, but it makes it nicer to come home to. I never liked how it looked before.

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Wow what a difference already! You really have an eye for this. :D

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rainbowgardener
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So much more welcoming, right? In its original incarnation you couldn't even see where the front door was nor how to get to it. The only entrance was to walk all the way up the driveway in the narrow space next to where the cars are parked, to the hidden stairs next to the right hand garage door and then all the way across the narrow porch to the door on the opposite end.... Plus to me, the lighter color instead of the nearly black wood, seems friendlier, less glowering.

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So I'm still trying to figure out what color we painted our house.

Valspar calls it Navajo Horizon, which is nice but not really a recognized color name. Looking at samples, taupe is too brown and mauve is too pink. There's something called "rose taupe" which is close, but doesn't seem exactly right. Suggestions?


Image

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applestar
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Hmm.. my daughter said “cocoa” ... I want to say “clay” but I don’t know if that’s right either.

I really like the natural tone of it.

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It really brightens the entry. It isn't such a dark hole anymore. If the path is a functional path and not a decorative one, I would align it where traffic would naturally flow anyway. I think it looks ok. It depends on the landscaping you put in the inner circle to guide people to the front door.

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Path will eventually be functional. Right now the pavers haven't been set in, just dropped where they are. Just trying to get the layout right, to know where to dig. And then we took time off to paint the house, which isn't quite finished yet.

We do at some point want the whole inner circle to be landscaped with a bird bath, some kind of small tree/shrub, some ground covers, etc. May take awhile. I'm not sure exactly how the landscape would guide to the door, which is now pretty obvious and will be even more so painted feng shui red.

We will probably scatter a few small (round?) stepping stones through there for getting to bird bath and hummingbird feeder.



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