25 January: projects completed

I accidentally published yesterday’s post in the PM instead of the AM, so apologies to the three of you who read it with your morning coffee! Because it was breathing down my neck to be so close to real time, I waited another day to publish this one.

Tuesday, 25 January 2022

At home

Allan got much done today. He finished refurbishing the door and hung it by the gear shed back yard in place of an old broken down door. We will probably get ten years out of it. He is going to put some wire in the middle section just to slow raccoons down a little.

The latch still needs installing. But I only use this door a couple of times a year to pull bindweed off the other side of the fence.

He also made a gate to the junk, I mean upcycle hoard (I mean collection). Before, the barrier (to neighbor dogs) was just an extra pallet and board, wodged in and heavy to maneuver.

The new gate used to be the front of a little parakeet bay window in our previous house. The parakeets were given to a new home (I didn’t really want birds but was given them) and the door will now be useful for giving biscuits to dogs. It is still a lift out rather than hinged gate.

The hoard has been diminished.

Finally, he hauled a papyrus out of the bigger pond. It had outgrown its planting basket and was blocking most of the pond view. I was going to put it in the grey tub…till I realized that idea would move the azolla, a floating invasive, down to the Bogsy end. So I’ll put it in another tub that I have, after it dries out just enough to be liftable.

Before

It’s out!

Meanwhile, except for when a friend came over and we walked through the garden and around the block via the easement road, I spent all day accomplishing very little. I fluffed some beds in the willow grove with the bucketed mulch that was stashed out there, and wheelbarrowed some more soil back.

I decided to move Forever Goldy to the Bogsy Wood…

…because it did not look right in the driveway garden.

It is behind a potted agave that also does not look right. I forgot to take it in during the snow and ice and its leaves got blasted.

Thuja ‘Forever Goldy’ is hard to place, for me. I think more than one would have been more attractive. The group of three at the Bayside Garden look much better. It just looks artificial somehow on its own. I made it a punctuation point at the end of a bed by the bridged swale. Below, on the other side of the tree from Goldy, it took me a ridiculous amount of time to add soil and an Escallonia ‘Iveyi’ to the west end of that bed. My accomplishments today were small.

I also realized I could remove a strip of lawn along the bridged swale, below, and use it to fill a low spot in the path. Exciting but won’t have time till tomorrow.

I added a couple of rocks and a piece of wood to the grey tub surround.

We celebrated the day of varied degrees of accomplishment with a campfire dinner.

Note the horizon of lights from the port businesses, a winter view that we cherish.

I look forward to a day of expanding part of the bridged swale tomorrow. Should be fun!