The Big Dig

Having a hillside garden means everything eventually wants to end at the bottom of the hill.  Water, top soil etc.

And with the slope is a greater chance of slipping and falling for mom and her friends.  It made sense to slow the slope with a series of low terraces and designated paths.  It also made sense to use that good top soil in the garden and create a depression to collect any rain run off.

And thus the big dig began, load after load dug up and pushed up the hill.  Down came the last of the old fencing, distinct paths around trees were created and terraces started.  We even have room to park a trailer now.  But what a lot of work!  And all in the summer heat no less.  This included removing two old palm tree stumps too.

We also did a bit of canning and picking of tomatoes

Added a sprinkler system and changed the drip system

 And added a run to our chicken coop

It has been a busy 16 months!

Roses Roses

Our new neighbor did not like the lolly pop effect of the standard roses that lined the entry walk.  She gave them away and we were lucky to get a bunch of them

And then the big lower garden project started.  It was a secret and a ton or two of work

More Yard Work

With our well used little garden shed set up, mom found her roll of old green house plastic.  So of course a hoop house style would just not work... Not the prettiest of green houses, but for the price it works

Once the green house was in the corner, we could not just sit in the dirt!  We needed a patio.  The boys and I bought enough 12x12 pavers to get Mom a nice new patio to enjoy her birthday on.  She enjoys sitting there with her friends for lunch.

Since some of her friends are her age, and sitting there is not so private, we added a fence section and a hand rail.  And just because we were bored, the irrigation water line sprung a leak and while repairing that it was obvious that the days for the old line to the house was in bad shape.  Up went the old walk and the old lines.

January brought us the neighbors picket fencing no longer needed and in the way of their remodel

We now have our winter garden in a cute fence and mom does not want to see any more white picket fence paint.

By April, we were cleaning up a few areas and adding roses and more roses and...roses.

And a new driveway entry arch!

The Garden Shed

We had no plans to build a garden shed right now, but when you get a stack of 7 sheets of 1" plywood, needed bad edges cut off so we had a stack of 3 1/2 x 7 sheets. Two for the front, two for the back, one for each side and one cut in half for a roof.  Perfect!

We even had some antique windows to match the house... so why not!

First the shell

Then some trim to match the old house

A window ledge, a shelf inside and a cat door.

 Some paint, inside and out, and an unimpressed Camilla with her "Little Hoe House"  Painted HD oops lavender inside.

Wow, it has been a busy year.

Guess it is time to catch up on the blog.

May 2011 is kind of where I left off.

June was busy, a minor repair turned in to a redo of a room, dry wall repairs, new window casing, paint carpet, lighting etc

Also a fresh coat of paint and some beadboard for the kitchen.  As of today it still needs a tile back splash and some other trims.

The Forth of July brought a street party to the home next door

August saw me busy fixing the entry walk, adding a trash corral and clearing out a street planter and trees.

I had to use 16x16 tiles to cover the stump of a bottle brush tree, it had finally died so we could remove the stump and make a better access point to the deck and ramp.  This included breaking up an old sidewalk or two.

Mom fussed a lot about the redo of the front, but the neighbors are remodeling and moving their driveway.  Fixing that part of the entry makes it easier for her friends to turn cars around too.  And just as we were making the trash corral, the providers changed and we suddenly had massive bins.  The neighbors liked the bin corral design and are thinking of how to do theirs.

Of course all that sidewalk "urbanite" could not go to waste and is now the patio around our fire pit.

And then we were offered some junk plywood on it's way to the dump......

Doors

For the first time in decades, long before my parents purchased their house their garage has doors!

They are still in the process of being painted and we ran out of the specially milled ruff sawn lumber for trim.  An old building needs similar old looking lumber.  So that will have to wait, as will windows in the main garage.  Someday, in not too far of the distant future, it will be my photo studio with lots of nice north light.  The rest of the garage needs a TON of work, but it is all progress.

The neighbors all slow down at they drive by to look, I don't think any of them thought it would ever look this good.  Decades of 4 sheets of plywood, 5 months of tarps and still untrimmed...Doors!  Late in the day cell phone photo, I will have to do better shortly!

Looks different than 

One Mans Treasure...............

One mans treasure is another mans trash.

In this odyssey of cleaning up my parents place, I have thought of this often, usually while hold some random rusted item. This week it has been the garages we have tackled. It was brought on by missing tools and hardware that we knew we had but just where did it go? First we cleaned out the storeroom and found many treasures, like wire cutters.

Most people think of their garage as a place to park a car, set up a pingpong table or do the laundry. Our garages have always been kind of a creepy mystery. I would poke my head in as a kid and look around, not sure what was going to jump out at me, knowing if I stepped all the way in past the leaning plywood sheet doors I would be covered in spiderwebs. And if my dad caught me, there was probably going to be trouble.

He was worried about the garages falling or me taking his treasures.

A few years before he passed, Dad decided I could clean up the far side of the garage, this was after I cleaned up the driveway and made it so a car could park there! He said there was nothing in there he really wanted other than a few things that he told me to leave those alone. I took load after load to metals recycling and the trash can. It was not perfect, but it was better. Over the past few years, that garage has filled back up with stuff. So this week we cleaned seriously. I used the old bent sheets of plywood to make a better wall between the two sides, they are up kind of temporarily so we can take down to fix the walls if we need too. We took down the wood storage rack he had built and tossed almost all the wood. No idea why he was keeping most it, but it was no longer worth keeping!

We also tackled the "good stuff" side of the garage. Mom was not sure she had been to the back of it. Dad even had a wall put up to keep the "good stuff" safe. I was looking forward to finding "the good stuff" I was thinking the TV show Pickers. Boy was I going to find some good stuff!

The good side of the garage is now empty.

What was the "good stuff"? I have no idea, I sure did not find it! Maybe it was the 6 5 gallon cans of Henrys road coating that are still sort of liquid, unlike the 1/2 full 55 gallon drum in the drive way. It might have been the 10 gallons of home brew weed oil or the sprayer. It could have been the 8 5 gallons containers of various paints, a couple seem to be water based the rest oil. I am sure it was not the 500 pounds of cement asbestos wall siding I will get to suit/mask up and hazmat package. Or the 100's of other cans of paints and petro chems that have to go to hazmat or recycling. Or the 200lbs of garden chem soil amendments in the rotten bags also for hazmat.

I did find some interesting old tools, most will hit ebay in the coming year. And best of all, the wooden swing seat I had in the tree as a kid.

But the real treasure? It has to be the empty garage that is going to become a photo studio.

I can see it now, freshly painted exposed beams and walls with a variety of vintage finds waiting to be used as props with the flowers and veggies from the garden.

Does it Ever End?

Last week I put the final sections of picket fencing up across the right side of the upper yard. Now to paint all those new pickets! And since the paint is different than the one we used when we did the front yard, those need a fresh coat too. I got the first coat of paint on all the new pickets and about 1/2 way through the old ones on that side too.

Mom has been commenting that her friends are afraid to drive up her street because their is no place to turn around. As a kid, if anyone even thought about parking in the turn-around point, old Mr George would be out yelling before they got their parking brake set. But, seems it has become a great place to double park now. I found a place to turn my car around tonight, but it was close and I can see how her friends don't like to drive up.

The neighbor is going to be adding a driveway directly across the street from her.

So, I think this means taking down a section of our fencing, breaking up some concrete sidewalk my dad put in, taking out a planter, removing some rocks, shoveling some dirt, cutting down a tree, digging up her bromiliads and turning our 1.5 car driveway in to a 3 car one.

Special

Today is an Important Day

Today marks a special day in the gardens history.

The truck has the last full load ready to drop at the dump. It has been a long, hard 6 years. Countless loads have been cut up, drug out and shoved in the back of the Nissan pick up and dropped off at the transfer station. I think we have taken out a dozen in just the past couple of weeks. The yucca is gone, the lower gate opens, closes, locks and allows for a truck to back in to the property. The 100 year old two horse stable still stands, leaning pretty good, but finally has no junk leaning on it or hiding inside. The permissions have been cut to a level they can be picked with your feet still on the ground. The kiwi is out of the telephone and cable lines, so it the gage plum. The old chicken house is gone and a fancy new one occupied with very happy hens. Root stock plums have been trimmed and only one zapote remains-and it just a collection of bobbed branches. Cactus and countless other trees are gone and the hedge of quava is trimmed and restored.

We have a few new trees and plans for more to replace those that died out or out grew their locations. The garden will have a new fence and be ready for a second year of veggies.

We still have a lot of neatening up to do, some digging and raking to level it up and countless stumps to pull out. But in due time it will be done

The neighbor stopped by today and said it is going to look like a park soon. Not sure if he knew, but it was always my dads wish that the land would be a park someday.

Surprises, Weeds and Other Garden Pests

It has been about 6 weeks since the last update on the garden. Unfortunately life gets in the way some times, but it also gives the plants time to grow. And of course, the weeds grow even faster.

The tomato garden is doing well, we should have a wide variety of tomatoes, from interesting colors to the garden standards to heirlooms. We set out a kitchen garden close to the house for the herbs, tomatoes and cucmbers, things my mom loves and eats the most.

Mom loves her cumcumbers, so I started some Lemon Cucumbers that are round and she picked out her favorite long green variety. We both started our seeds at home and they have now been transplanted. I was happy to see how well her green plants were growing, they were much bigger than my yellow ones.

Oddly this year her zuchini plants did not do well starting from seed, we ended up purchasing a 6 pack of plants to put in the main garden. This is the first time in weeks that I have had enough time to actually stop and look at the plants. Those cucumbers of moms sure are getting big, then I looked close.......one had a small cucmber starting....only it is shaped like a cumber and is green like a cucumber. But clearly, something was not right. And I think we solved the zuchini plants that would not start....they were labeled Cucumbers. Mom swears it was the seed package. Either way, we have new cucumber seeds to plant and will be having a bumper crop of zuchini to share!

With all of the rain we have had, we have a lot of green growing, too bad much of it is weeds. Now with chickens, the weeds with in their reach are those that the hens refuse to eat. Since we have kept the hens out of the front yard and around the house, I have plenty to pick and spent about 3 hours pulling them out of the path and planters. As I was using the leaf blower I noticed that we had bees looking for a new place to live in the house, so a very smokey and low (cool) fire was quickly started in the wood stove in the house and I grabbed the hose and helped the bees decide that it was not a friendly place for them to live. Guessing it will be an on going battle this summer, I have to cover (cap off) the chimney and wrap with window screen to keep them out. The chimney is in rough shape and we had planned on removing the wood stove already. Add that to my list of things to do.

Mom loves using her gopher weed to help keep the critters from visiting, she lets them grow tall and go to seed............and boy did they go to seed! The sap is toxic, so we will be spending some time with gloves on pulling hundreds of them from inside of the garden and all of those that venture past garden fence line. She also cleaned up the extra fruit last year by tossing them in where the garden is now, add a few hundred baby fruit trees coming up. And those stupid zapotes refuse to give up, we have hundreds of them trying to pop up all over too.

We did have several types of plants almost wiped out by garden pests. Mom had planted a lot of cabbage, kale and broccoli in the main garden. It was coming up and looking pretty good. Until some garden pests came through.

This weeks gardening lesson is:

When showing off your garden and hard work to your friends who do not have chickens, make sure you close the gates behind them. They must have left a gate open and Mr Rooster and his four hens came and helped themselves to broccoli, cabbage and kale. Hopefully enough is left of the plants so they will come back, if not I guess we will be planting them again.

Mid March Update

The rains have come, and with the installation of a rain gauge, they have gone.

The ground has dried out enough we can dig in it and have even had to re-wet a section that is too compacted to get a shovel to break up the dirt.

As of today, we have taken out several more loads of wood, branches, palm tree trunks, yucca and old bee pollen traps. The metal man came again and took out a big load, included the old "smoker" aka refrigerator and the heavy metal rack.

Suddenly, we have a beautiful place to sit under the fruit trees and enjoy the garden. Who knew! I am looking forward to finishing the clean up of that area.

But for now, we have plants that need to go in the vegetable garden area:

As of today:

We have 4 new blue berries: two Sharpblue, Misty and Oneil.

Two new rows of Boysen Berries, two plants are new from the nursery, the first flower appeared today. The rest are made up of runners we dug up and transplanted. We hope they are good plants and not the naturalized black berry canes. Only time will tell.

Two new rows of Raspberries, also dug up and transplanted from where we will plant potatoes next week.

A tomatillo, tomato, artichokes, leaks, zucchini and two random asparagus.

Beans, Scarlet Runners and three colors of pole beans, Lima Beans and Snap Peas.

Peppers: red, green, a 6-pack of unusual colors, three banana, three Anaheim and three Jalapenos! Now for the salsa recipes!

One egg plant is in, but several are started and just waiting to get big enough.

We still have to dig some more for the root veggie section and then finish digging up the winter squash-muskmelon-watermelon area.

Considering this whole area was an over grown orchard with tiny sections that Mom carved out as small clear garden patches just a couple of months ago, it is the start of a hopefully amazing crop. If nothing else, it looks much better for the neighbors, the trip hazards are greatly reduced and should she fall, people walking up the street can see her. And, we have clear access to the dozens of fruit trees, several still need trimming and most will get a good thinning out once we can determine which limbs are productive and which are not.

The almost dead grapefruit has already shown up how happy it is with the work we have done, it is covered in fresh leaves and tiny flower buds.

Mid February Progress Update

One Month Later

Progress has been made, with a week off here and their due to rain and drying times. The fence now goes completely around the garden. Two gates are in but we need one more, craigslist deal I hope! We ran out of the free fencing we were using, and ran out of the left over chainlink, we may end up buying some welded wire, but I really wanted to wait until next year so we could easily make layout changes.

One thing different from a month ago, the tree behind my mom is missing now. It turned out that the tree she wanted to save was totally dead and rotten. I leaned up against it, and it moved....moved a LOT. It had one side with a root runner that was still alive, but I think Mom could have pushed the tree over on her own. On the far side of the top photo, you can see the artichoke plants and across the garden. We filled 4 trash cans with boysen berry canes, we probably will have one more can full by the time we finish digging up the runners. But it is progress. On the downside, I counted over 20 medium sized tree stumps to dig out....ugh

We moved a couple of chairs down and saved a couple of vintage things to use in the flower beds to come. The old Orchard ladder and orchard box truck are going to be covered in sweet pea vines.

At home, I have cups of seeds to start for the flower border on the outside of the garden fence. It has to be plants that either chickens don't want to eat or can put up with some 2 legged cultivators.....

Progress January

Spring does not wait on us...........

Clearing and out transforming an overgrown and neglected garden of this size is a serious project, it is easy to spend a day working and be exhausted at the end of the day. When you look back, you have to remind yourself there was progress, even if your not sure the neighbors would agree.

We had a week of rain and then it took some time for the ground to dry so we can walk in it again. But this past week, about a dozen smaller tree stumps were pulled up, dirt was shoveled from a high part that wanted to dump dirt in the street in the rain and instead used to fill a part that was too low.

Two more loads of branches, the too big or crooked for the chipper and too small to cut for free firewood made it to the transfer station to be chipped up for some one else to use. A load of old wood and lumber went off to be ground up too.

For this first year, we are using plastic fencing, recycled from a finished school project and found by the side of the road. We will see if we like the lay out of the garden this year and then use a more durable fencing next year.

Of course we have a lot of extra help, the hens hoping for a worm to be turned over and they help us distribute the fresh dirt.

Starting the Garden in January

We have been busy; trees cut, small branches chipped, and limbs ready for the green waste. And had a BIG load of old scrap metal hauled away....free (the hauler will sell, but all we had to do was make a pile and call him!)

I also pulled up some old wire fencing for a better garden by the house and walk for my mom to grow the more thirsty plants and the ones she picks and eats daily. We had an old gate that matched, not enough for all 4 sides, but the front will look good and who knows what else we will find as we finish clearing out the lower garden.

And....the first load of horse manure too......boy was she happy and I sure drove carefully with that in the bad end of the truck! We spread and dug some of it, probably need a couple more days to really get the beds ready to plant..........but she is ready!

And of all things to find in the yard, my dad must have drug home some kind of underground vault cover (nothing under it but dirt) maybe he thought it would be good to walk on, who knows.....guess it goes with the kitchen sink we found, faucet, toilet, and all the other finds.

Merry Christmas 2009

Tis the season to clear the garden...fa-lala-lala-lalala

It is amazing what a friend with a chain saw can to do help out the cause. Two more Zapote trees are now fire wood stacked on the street for neighbors to take and a big pile of small branches for the new little chipper. Persimmon trees came down too, after about a month of picking the 15 or so trees we had and giving them away, we are trying to get the yard to a point that Mom has plenty to share with friends, neighbors and church members and not a full time job.

It is sad to see some of them go, as young plants they were my dads pride and joy, but a decade of neglect and no pruning had left the garden over grown by a few trees that turned out to be pests (zapotes) and permissions that were 30 feet in the air. We have to remind ourselves that even though he would hate the sound of the chain saw........he would have never meant the yard to get this out of control.

The neighbors across the street came home from their vacation and about had a heart attack when they saw the formerly 12 foot hedge down to about 5 feet. I had cut the strawberry quava hedge down to about 8 feet a couple of years ago rather than die like my dad figured it would do, it grew with a vengeance and put out more fruit than ever, unfortunately about 12 feet off the ground! We had just pulled out the saw when the Fed's pulled up with his fruit fly traps, a bit of promising that we were going to cut it right now, got him to put the traps in other trees and not have these off limits to touch for a few months. We are now busy cleaning up the garden (and the view for the neighbors) and getting ready for spring planting. Mom should have the vegetable garden that she always wanted and it will be safer than in the past. All the old wire is getting pulled up, all the old rusty fencing is being replaced, real gates, new terraces, easy access to the fruit trees and should she fall in the garden, she will be visible from the street. A real concern since she is 86 and does not see as well as she used too and still wants to climb ladders.

Ashes Ashes .........

Mom's sun porch is done (sort of), the curtains are up and furniture set up. We have a few details to finish and a ceiling fan to shop for, but for now she is enjoying her room.

I gave the deck a fresh coat of stain, but between the heat and then fog, and yet another wild fire........a fresh coat of paint on the railing and new gate will have to wait

Painted Trim and the Day Bed Returns

July 15th, 2009

Today a coat of "Swiss Coffee" paint on went on the trim and the old day bed of mine went in the sun porch.


The old door got a fresh coat of white and the old paint scrapped off the door knob and plate.

And a couple of chairs for the drop leaf table that will be there shortly.

It is a small room, but Mom wants to be able to have company stay the night, or sit and have tea with a friend.

And once we find the right chair, be able to sit and read in the sun.