First Day in the Garden

I was so afraid that I lost all desire to garden over this winter.  I hadn't looked at a single garden magazine or planned anything out.  The oppressive summer last year really got to me.  It made gardening too tedious.  So come July and August it would take care of its self.

Today just happened to be a bright sunny day in March.  Hitting 58 degrees. Whenever the sun shines brightly on a warm winter day the garden inevitably calls. I looked at my garden calendar and thought I am already behind. Could have started the first batch of lettuce and spinach last week.  Well garden's won't seed themselves so I took a trip to Lowe's to see what plants they had in this early.  Came back with some peat moss, compost, a beautiful golden false cypress 
and a holly sky pencil.
I already know just where to put those two.

My plan this year is to start adding more and more shrubs.  It is getting too hard for me to keep up with the up keep of all the perennials.  I also have a spot in my back yard where the mulberry tree, a.k.a. stink-berry tree, drops all of it fruit.  That is where I am going to plant my beautiful golden cypress.  It eventually gets to ten feet round.  That should take up the base of the tree.

So today was leveling day.  I leveled most of my front garden to the ground.  There was a lot to cut back and clean out.  Mums, Russian Sage, ornamental grasses, Sedum, cat mint and a whole lot more. I left it all up over the winter to protect them from kids that would run through and trample the garden in the snow.

 I cut back the rough looking foliage around my Lenten Roses.  Hello!  Now I can see you.  They had been in bloom for two weeks already and it even snowed on them.  Now they look stunning.  My bluebells are the first things to poke out of the ground in February and they are several inches tall now. 
 My daffodils are about the same height.

It is a relief to get out in the garden and breathe the fresh air.  I think I feel the garden bug again, finally.