Just a girl with a hammer

Category: Uncategorized

  • Just a girl with a nail gun

    Just a girl with a nail gun

    This spring I actually experienced spring fever for the first time in many years. I felt itchy to get in the garden and I purchased prolific amounts of plants via mail order and local nurseries. Our dog and her friends ran roughshod over the garden and I didn’t even care because the seal was broken and I! was! buying! everything!



    I grew sweet peas (‘April in Paris’) for the first time and, holy shit, people, those smell as good as everyone says they do. I got my new plant babies in the ground in a timely fashion! I kept thinking, “This is my year. I’m going to stay on top of weeds and for once I won’t be embarrassed to have people over.”
    Then I had to travel to California a bunch of times and then the weather turned hot and my brain and body lost all of their go-go. Oxalis covered everything and Greg would helpfully ask, “Do you think you should do something about that?” and I would glare at him and return to melting in front of the garden mister.



    This was not my year. I didn’t stay up on weeding. That said, I did achieve a couple of things. I replaced the rotting fence between us and our newest neighbors. They are delightful but they smoke constantly and they have a clear view of our yard from the raised deck off the back of their house. So we asked if we could replace the fence and foot the bill. I disassembled the old fence and built the new one in three hours one Sunday morning while Greg was gone because NAIL GUNS ARE AWESOME. 


    Before

    After



    Weirdos from Craigslist took the old boards for reuse and I drank two cocktails at a tiki bar and took an epic four hour nap. The fence is now seven feet tall, which should also help block the view of our backyard from the three-story condos that were recently built at the end of our block. 

    I also reorganized our garage, which looked like the touchdown site of a tornado. Our garage is long and skinny and full of junk. It looks like the inside of my purse but dirtier and with more things that draw blood. The previous owner, a paranoid mess who wrapped every heat register in the house in tin foil (so the government can’t listen in on you), installed a useless shelf with a gigantic mirror tilted back. 




    See, I don’t need safety measures like mirrors to know if someone is sneaking up on me because I left 900 nursery pots at the entrance of the garage. There’s a pile of styrofoam you can fall on, too.




    We finally took the mirror down, demoed the shelf, and removed a weird cabinet in the corner that we used to store spiders.

    We moved our metal shelves to the back and I built a potting table, modified from this video I found on YouTube. Men have largely convinced women that we’ll kill ourselves if we use power tools but it turns out building stuff isn’t that hard and its super fun.



    Then I added hanging storage to the walls and now sometimes I just stand in my garage and coo in this general direction. As my mother always says, “Simple minds = simple pleasures.”



    Next up we’re having the yellow bamboo that came with the house removed. It has been terribly behaved, sending rhizomes through the root balls of neighboring plants, at a shocking speed. It leaves culm litter everywhere and it sucks. WHY IS THIS THE BAMBOO HOME DEPOT SELLS EVERYONE? In its place I’m planting Chusqea culeou, which is a true clumper that shouldn’t be quite so messy.



    Next year is going to be my year, I can just feel it. I’m going to stay on top of weeds and for once I won’t be embarrassed to have people over. And I will buy a lot of plants, that I know is true.

  • Happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing

    Happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing

    Lately I’ve been appreciating a bit of seredipity in the entrance to the backyard. Back in 2011 I posted about how I wanted the entrance to the back garden to envelop you, so you’d get a slow reveal to the rest of the yard. 

    After a couple of unsuccessful plantings (mock orange, flowering currant, some other stuff) I planted a Ceanothus thyrsiflorus in 2012 and it grew quickly.

    My neighbors had a gorgeous ceanothus that spilled into our side yard and it had been trained as a tree:

    When the next door house was flipped and sold they removed this ceanothus and I lost all the shade in my side yard.

    I’d never really seen another Ceanothus because I was new to gardening so I didn’t realize most people let them grow as shrubs. I limbed up mine too and now it provides a nice canopy along the pathway. Most visitors don’t recognize what it is because, you know, it should be a shrub. Or maybe the straight species is always a tree but everyone grows more exciting cultivars like ‘Dark Star‘.

    Tree sized in six years!

    I don’t always love this ceanothus because its bloom time is short and the flowers aren’t as intensely colored as some of the named cultivars. It’s also messy once the blooms die. The good news is they don’t live very long so I’ll probably be shopping for a new tree/shrub in the next ten years.

    Please also admire the color echo between the hosta and the hose junking up the photo. Based on every photo I have ever taken it looks like I live in a hose-testing facility.

    And since we’re looking at that old post, let’s do a before and after!

    Before
    After
    Looking back at the entrance, you can see that my wine barrel has since been planted with bamboo, the rain garden was installed, and everything grew like crazy. That old bit of fence on the left was removed as well.

    Before
    After

    Standing in the middle of the yard and looking at the back of the house you can see that we were, in 2011, considering building a huge deck off the back of the house. It’s not all happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing! What the fuck were we thinking?

    Before
    After

    Another gigantic whatthefuck was forming here with that goofy shaped bed (hinted at here with stones on the lawn). Circles and squares, damn it! None of this freestyle nonsense!

    Before
    After
    So the moral of the story is that you can limb up your ceanothus but you shouldn’t hire Greg or I to design decks or raised beds for you. We suck at it.
  • Happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing

    Happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing

    Lately I’ve been appreciating a bit of seredipity in the entrance to the backyard. Back in 2011 I posted about how I wanted the entrance to the back garden to envelop you, so you’d get a slow reveal to the rest of the yard. 

    After a couple of unsuccessful plantings (mock orange, flowering currant, some other stuff) I planted a Ceanothus thyrsiflorus in 2012 and it grew quickly.

    My neighbors had a gorgeous ceanothus that spilled into our side yard and it had been trained as a tree:

    When the next door house was flipped and sold they removed this ceanothus and I lost all the shade in my side yard.

    I’d never really seen another Ceanothus because I was new to gardening so I didn’t realize most people let them grow as shrubs. I limbed up mine too and now it provides a nice canopy along the pathway. Most visitors don’t recognize what it is because, you know, it should be a shrub. Or maybe the straight species is always a tree but everyone grows more exciting cultivars like ‘Dark Star‘.

    Tree sized in six years!

    I don’t always love this ceanothus because its bloom time is short and the flowers aren’t as intensely colored as some of the named cultivars. It’s also messy once the blooms die. The good news is they don’t live very long so I’ll probably be shopping for a new tree/shrub in the next ten years.

    Please also admire the color echo between the hosta and the hose junking up the photo. Based on every photo I have ever taken it looks like I live in a hose-testing facility.

    And since we’re looking at that old post, let’s do a before and after!

    Before
    After
    Looking back at the entrance, you can see that my wine barrel has since been planted with bamboo, the rain garden was installed, and everything grew like crazy. That old bit of fence on the left was removed as well.

    Before
    After

    Standing in the middle of the yard and looking at the back of the house you can see that we were, in 2011, considering building a huge deck off the back of the house. It’s not all happy accidents when you don’t know what you’re doing! What the fuck were we thinking?

    Before
    After

    Another gigantic whatthefuck was forming here with that goofy shaped bed (hinted at here with stones on the lawn). Circles and squares, damn it! None of this freestyle nonsense!

    Before
    After
    So the moral of the story is that you can limb up your ceanothus but you shouldn’t hire Greg or I to design decks or raised beds for you. We suck at it.
  • Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day May 2018

    Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day May 2018

    So when I recently attended the Garden Bloggers Fling I got to meet Carol, the godmother of Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day. She has a cute illustration of a Victorian woman pushing a lawn mower on her website and, because I am a dolt, my brain filed this away literally. I pictured her as an older woman with flowing gray hair. She wears pantaloons and she carries a wicker basket to collect flowers.

    In reality, Carol is a modern woman who wears pants and rocks a blond pixie cut. I tell you this in case you were similarly confused.

    And you know what? I just looked at that photo again and it’s not a Victorian woman. It’s like an English woman, maybe turn of the century? It’s a wonder I’m gainfully employed.

    Anyway, it’s so bloomy right now! This could take a while.

    Phacelia viscida

    Lonicera brownii ‘Dropmore Scarlet’

    Echium wildpretii

    Stipa gigantea

    Oxalis oregana

    Calamagrostis foliosa 

    Festuca amethystina ‘Superba’

    Allium schubertii

    Syringa patula ‘Miss Kim’

    Allium ‘Purple Sensation’

    Salvia nemerosa ‘Caradonna’

    Stipa gigantea ‘Little Giant’

    Camassia leichtlinii semiplena

    Lewisia cotyledon

    Lewisia cotyledon ‘White Splendor’

    Rhazya orientalis

    Parahebe perfoliata

    Dierama pulcherrimum

    Phlomis russeliana

    Amsonia hubrichtii

    Geranium macrorrhizum

    Arctostaphylos ‘John Dourley’

    Spiraea betulifolia var. lucida
    Fuchsia speciosa

    Podophyllum pleianthum

    Salvia ‘Skyscraper’

    Ceanothus thyrsiflorus

    Cuphea x ‘Strybing Sunset’

    Cerinthe purpurascens
    Bletilla striata

    Whew, we made it! Thanks again to our host, Carol, who is neither a Victorian, nor a Dowager Countess, who maintains her idyllic manor with a push mower and a snarky aside.

  • Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day May 2018

    Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day May 2018

    So when I recently attended the Garden Bloggers Fling I got to meet Carol, the godmother of Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day. She has a cute illustration of a Victorian woman pushing a lawn mower on her website and, because I am a dolt, my brain filed this away literally. I pictured her as an older woman with flowing gray hair. She wears pantaloons and she carries a wicker basket to collect flowers.

    In reality, Carol is a modern woman who wears pants and rocks a blond pixie cut. I tell you this in case you were similarly confused.

    And you know what? I just looked at that photo again and it’s not a Victorian woman. It’s like an English woman, maybe turn of the century? It’s a wonder I’m gainfully employed.

    Anyway, it’s so bloomy right now! This could take a while.

    Phacelia viscida

    Lonicera brownii ‘Dropmore Scarlet’

    Echium wildpretii

    Stipa gigantea

    Oxalis oregana

    Calamagrostis foliosa 

    Festuca amethystina ‘Superba’

    Allium schubertii

    Syringa patula ‘Miss Kim’

    Allium ‘Purple Sensation’

    Salvia nemerosa ‘Caradonna’

    Stipa gigantea ‘Little Giant’

    Camassia leichtlinii semiplena

    Lewisia cotyledon

    Lewisia cotyledon ‘White Splendor’

    Rhazya orientalis

    Parahebe perfoliata

    Dierama pulcherrimum

    Phlomis russeliana

    Amsonia hubrichtii

    Geranium macrorrhizum

    Arctostaphylos ‘John Dourley’

    Spiraea betulifolia var. lucida
    Fuchsia speciosa

    Podophyllum pleianthum

    Salvia ‘Skyscraper’

    Ceanothus thyrsiflorus

    Cuphea x ‘Strybing Sunset’

    Cerinthe purpurascens
    Bletilla striata

    Whew, we made it! Thanks again to our host, Carol, who is neither a Victorian, nor a Dowager Countess, who maintains her idyllic manor with a push mower and a snarky aside.

  • Bugs, booze, and brisket

    Bugs, booze, and brisket

    I recently returned from the Austin Garden Bloggers’ Fling, which was so fun I feel like I could sleep for a week. I ate my weight in brisket, I got bitten by both chiggers and fire ants, and I drank gallons of margaritas. I even saw the Alamo, so I’m feeling pretty complete.

    Just another perfect, humongous Agave ovatafolia

    In the garden of Pam Penick

    A lot of times touring other gardens can make me feel pretty down on my own but this trip felt like a good, inspiring shot in the arm. Austin gardens have something for everyone, from super modern corten steel to quirky nichos.

    Veg plots at the Mirador garden

    Nicho in the garden of Lucinda Hutson

    Austin has so many more trees than I expected, even in areas of new construction. I suspect the need for shade is so great that they work around existing trees instead of leveling everything like they do in Portland. As we’re both trying to keep our cities weird, it was hard not to compare the two.

    Construction in my Portland neighborhood. They removed six old redwoods to build these.

    When they say “everything is bigger in Texas” they are referring to their agaves, their margaritas, and their highway on-ramps, which are terrifyingly tall. Every time we drove over one, seemingly 1000 feet in the air, I felt like a country bumpkin. They must have gotten a huge amount of infrastructure money because all of the freeways and highways are seemingly under construction, all at once.

    I found myself in love all over again with salvias of the greggii and microphylla variety. Gardeners tuck them in everywhere all over Austin and they seem to look great, no matter the color.

    I also fell in love with Aspidistra elatior, which falls under the “useful but unexciting plant that comes with your yard when you buy a house in Austin” category. I have plenty of friends that grow this plant but it took me flying to Texas to notice it. I’ve said it before: everything is more magical when you go through life not really paying attention. Surprises are everywhere!

    I was also impressed by the lack of litter in Texas. That “Don’t Mess with Texas” slogan is working. Washington employs “Litter and It Will Hurt” which is somehow more menacing and yet less effective. Oregon doesn’t have a slogan (that I know of), it just sits and passively sighs and glares while you litter, wishing you wouldn’t. It would say something but we’re polite and we don’t do that sort of thing.

    Now that I have a dog I am even more aware of how filthy Portland’s close-in neighborhoods are. Going on walks is such an adventure now. What will I pull out of Bee’s mouth this time? A Q-tip? A cigarette butt? A rotting pineapple? ALL OF THESE THINGS HAVE HAPPENED.

    I eat anything

    I got to see gardens that I’ve loved online for years, including Jenny Stocker’s (of Rockrose fame), which was so genuinely thrilling I considered taking a xanax that morning so I wouldn’t embarrass myself. Her garden was a revelation for me when I started gardening and it was even better in person.

    I also got to see Pam Penick’s garden, which was so fucking delightful and beautiful I want to live in her pump house.

    Pam can create vignettes like no one else.

    Mostly I realized how much I like gardens that really go for it. I spend a lot of mental bandwidth worrying that people are judging my garden choices behind my back. I police my style because I don’t want to make mistakes. I’m not a designer and I don’t make a living in the horticulture industry. I’m a librarian, for Pete’s sake, I’m expected to be boring and unstylish. If someone doesn’t like my mismatched pots they can drink a Mexican martini in the garden of someone more talented.

    Because I experienced my first Mexican martini and I am HERE FOR IT.

    (It’s just a double margarita with an olive, served in a martini glass and a shaker on the side “because it’s classy.”)

    Life is short, why not make your margarita twice the size and embrace your inner mermaid? More is more.

  • Bugs, booze, and brisket

    Bugs, booze, and brisket

    I recently returned from the Austin Garden Bloggers’ Fling, which was so fun I feel like I could sleep for a week. I ate my weight in brisket, I got bitten by both chiggers and fire ants, and I drank gallons of margaritas. I even saw the Alamo, so I’m feeling pretty complete.

    Just another perfect, humongous Agave ovatafolia

    In the garden of Pam Penick

    A lot of times touring other gardens can make me feel pretty down on my own but this trip felt like a good, inspiring shot in the arm. Austin gardens have something for everyone, from super modern corten steel to quirky nichos.

    Veg plots at the Mirador garden

    Nicho in the garden of Lucinda Hutson

    Austin has so many more trees than I expected, even in areas of new construction. I suspect the need for shade is so great that they work around existing trees instead of leveling everything like they do in Portland. As we’re both trying to keep our cities weird, it was hard not to compare the two.

    Construction in my Portland neighborhood. They removed six old redwoods to build these.

    When they say “everything is bigger in Texas” they are referring to their agaves, their margaritas, and their highway on-ramps, which are terrifyingly tall. Every time we drove over one, seemingly 1000 feet in the air, I felt like a country bumpkin. They must have gotten a huge amount of infrastructure money because all of the freeways and highways are seemingly under construction, all at once.

    I found myself in love all over again with salvias of the greggii and microphylla variety. Gardeners tuck them in everywhere all over Austin and they seem to look great, no matter the color.

    I also fell in love with Aspidistra elatior, which falls under the “useful but unexciting plant that comes with your yard when you buy a house in Austin” category. I have plenty of friends that grow this plant but it took me flying to Texas to notice it. I’ve said it before: everything is more magical when you go through life not really paying attention. Surprises are everywhere!

    I was also impressed by the lack of litter in Texas. That “Don’t Mess with Texas” slogan is working. Washington employs “Litter and It Will Hurt” which is somehow more menacing and yet less effective. Oregon doesn’t have a slogan (that I know of), it just sits and passively sighs and glares while you litter, wishing you wouldn’t. It would say something but we’re polite and we don’t do that sort of thing.

    Now that I have a dog I am even more aware of how filthy Portland’s close-in neighborhoods are. Going on walks is such an adventure now. What will I pull out of Bee’s mouth this time? A Q-tip? A cigarette butt? A rotting pineapple? ALL OF THESE THINGS HAVE HAPPENED.

    I eat anything

    I got to see gardens that I’ve loved online for years, including Jenny Stocker’s (of Rockrose fame), which was so genuinely thrilling I considered taking a xanax that morning so I wouldn’t embarrass myself. Her garden was a revelation for me when I started gardening and it was even better in person.

    I also got to see Pam Penick’s garden, which was so fucking delightful and beautiful I want to live in her pump house.

    Pam can create vignettes like no one else.

    Mostly I realized how much I like gardens that really go for it. I spend a lot of mental bandwidth worrying that people are judging my garden choices behind my back. I police my style because I don’t want to make mistakes. I’m not a designer and I don’t make a living in the horticulture industry. I’m a librarian, for Pete’s sake, I’m expected to be boring and unstylish. If someone doesn’t like my mismatched pots they can drink a Mexican martini in the garden of someone more talented.

    Because I experienced my first Mexican martini and I am HERE FOR IT.

    (It’s just a double margarita with an olive, served in a martini glass and a shaker on the side “because it’s classy.”)

    Life is short, why not make your margarita twice the size and embrace your inner mermaid? More is more.

  • Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day April 2018

    Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day April 2018

    It’s one of my favorite months of the year! In spite of a pretty mild winter, we’ve had a pretty cold spring and everything is just a little behind schedule for me.

    Tulipa ‘Flair’

    Tulipa ‘Black Parrot’

    Tulipa ‘El Nino’

    Camassia leichtlinii ‘Blue Danube’

    Epimedium grandiflorum ‘Red Queen’

    Geranium macrorrhizum

    Epimedium ‘Red Sea’

    Mahonia nervosa

    Loropetalum chinense ‘Sizzling Pink’

    Freesia alba

    Eriogonum oreganum

    Magnolia laevifolia

    Epimedium x versicolor ‘Sulphureum’

    Prosartes hookeri Hooker’s Fairy Bells

    Epimedium pinnatum v. ‘Colchicum’

    Oxalis oregana

    Othonna cheirifolia
    Viola glabella

    This motherfucker

    A happiest of bloom days to you! Thanks, as always, to our host Carol.

  • Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day April 2018

    Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day April 2018

    It’s one of my favorite months of the year! In spite of a pretty mild winter, we’ve had a pretty cold spring and everything is just a little behind schedule for me.

    Tulipa ‘Flair’

    Tulipa ‘Black Parrot’

    Tulipa ‘El Nino’

    Camassia leichtlinii ‘Blue Danube’

    Epimedium grandiflorum ‘Red Queen’

    Geranium macrorrhizum

    Epimedium ‘Red Sea’

    Mahonia nervosa

    Loropetalum chinense ‘Sizzling Pink’

    Freesia alba

    Eriogonum oreganum

    Magnolia laevifolia

    Epimedium x versicolor ‘Sulphureum’

    Prosartes hookeri Hooker’s Fairy Bells

    Epimedium pinnatum v. ‘Colchicum’

    Oxalis oregana

    Othonna cheirifolia
    Viola glabella

    This motherfucker

    A happiest of bloom days to you! Thanks, as always, to our host Carol.

  • Vines, all the vines!

    Vines, all the vines!

    I’ve been installing trellising material on every surface available so I can garden vertically this year.

    L.l

    I actually have a lot of vines planted in my garden, but they all look terrible because they clearly state on the tag, “NEEDS SOMETHING TO CLIMB” and I said, “Is that really important? Eh, they’ll evolve or something without support. I’ll just let them figure it out.”

    This doesn’t work. They all lay about on the ground getting eaten by slugs and looking terrible. So I’m supporting my goddamn vines for once. And I’m planting a LOT more of them.

    What I already have:

    Akebia longeracemosa ‘Victor’s Secret’
    This poor vine has been hacked back twice, once after we removed the franken-fence from the side entrance from the garden, and again when I installed the trellising. The vine had created such a complicated french braid with about a thousand tendrils that I had to cut it way back and try to salvage a couple of strands with buds on them. It’s a pretty vigorous vine but not as bad as, say, Clematis armandii.

    Clematis cirrhosa ‘Wisley Cream’
    This is a super tough evergreen vine that blooms in winter. I think I want to plant another one to scramble up the front of the former franken-fence so I can see it from the kitchen window.

    Lonicera sempervirens ‘Major Wheeler’

    Trachelospermum jasminoides
    I planted this in 2011 (to hide our trashcans) and it only took about four years to completely cover this trellis, maybe less. The flowers smell amazing and when I get my shit together to give it some summer water, it reblooms.

    Lonicera periclymenum ‘Serotina’
    Scott and I were walking through Cistus Nursery when we got hit by the most amazing fragrance. We ran around trying to figure out who it was and I came home with this vine. Have the flowers ever been fragrant at my house? I don’t think so. Do I care? No. Look at the flowers! That’s good shit.

    x Fatshedera lizei ‘Annemieke’
    I saw this vine on Loree’s blog and fell in love. She responsibly texted me from Garden Fever and said, “They have it, get down here now, missy.” This vine is perfection and grows in complete shade. Thank you, Loree.

    Schizophragma hydrangeoides ‘Moonlight’
    I bought this vine so many years ago but never gave it anything to climb so it has largely looked like a mangled piece of rope, trailing through a pile of Doug Fir dander. It should look like this.

    Photo source: Broken Arrow Nursery

    Parthenocissus quinquefolia ‘Troki’
    “Haven’t I seen that growing on a freeway embankment?” you might be thinking to yourself. Yes, you have. I love it anyway.

    Clematis jackmanii
    Another one I haven’t given a trellis to. I also don’t water it when I should. I’m going to be better this year, I swear.

    I’ve bought and killed a LOT of other vines but I won’t bore you with that. Things that I have planned for purchase include:

    Mandevilla laxa, Chilean Jasmine

    Photo source: Annie’s Annuals

    Passiflora edulis ‘Frederick’ (I killed this once when I planted it in the wrong place and neglected to water it)

    Photo source: Annie’s Annuals

    Passiflora x ‘Star of Surbiton’ (I killed this one when I left it unprotected in its nursery pot during a particularly bad winter)

    Photo source: Xera Plants

    Passiflora actinia (I’m treating this one as an annual)

    Photo source: Annie’s Annuals

    Sweet peas (Lathyrus odoratus)! I’ve never grown them before and I currently have ‘April in Paris’ and ‘Navy’ in the ground.

    Photo source: Australian Seed

    Jasminum officiale ‘Devon Cream’

    Photo source: Xera Plants

    Holboellia aff. chapaensis

    Photo source: Far Reaches Farm

    Hedera algeriensis “Gloire de Marengo.’ I took some cuttings from Megan and I’m hoping they take root.

    Photo source: Promesse de Fleurs

    Clematis ‘The Countess of Wessex’

    Photo source: Brushwood Nursery

    Do you have any vines you can’t be without? I’ve got trellises for days and my ears are open.