I'm beat!

I finished the mulching today while Bob was in Seattle. He's getting a second opinion on back surgery at Virginia Mason. The gravel paths turned out really nicely. Now we'll see what plants survived the move. I'm planning to plant irises and peonies too. You can see there are mountains of mulch and gravel left that we'll use other places. Bob already started a project at the back of the garage to use up the gravel. I have a couple of rose bushes to move. One is the climbing rose at the front of the house. It's growing like gang busters but is prone to molds in spring so I'm going to try placing it someplace with better air circulation. I bought a lemon cypress at a sale last weekend to replace it. Hope to get to that later this week. My hands and arms are begging for a break.

Almost done

The plants are in just in time for rainy weather. A little more mulch and rock should be put in today and the rest is up to us. 

This bed was entirely replaced with just a few plants. Should make weeding easier. I love the new table top pine.

The big juniper or hebe that grew in this bed gave up the ghost recently so that was ripped out and I put the Japanese maple that wasn't doing so well in its previous location to that spot. A large heather was removed to make way for a little rhody. The landscaper reused some plants from other areas to save us money.

This is the bed where the cement slab used to be. Now it's growing a weeping blue atlas cedar and a weeping hemlock with some winter heather and a creeping ceanothus.

I love the way the trunk has been trained on the weeping blue atlas cedar.

My beautiful Cotinus Grace was dying from verticilium wilt so I had an opportunity to rework the flower bed in back.

This is the new bed at the side of the house where plants removed from the front were planted. Bob wants to build an arbor swing in the center.

Three cuties, Gimpy, Timmi and Mocha.

Landscaping

Lots of bodies and equipment to do the work on this project. It should be finished today.

Around the house

A new landscape project started up today. The stamped concrete pad in front of the house is being ripped out to make space for a simple entry landscaping. Across the driveway the weedy mess of plants at the point (across from the cars in second picture) is being removed to make way for a new look. The plants removed from that area will go into the back yard in a new bed adjacent the patio that will connect the two existing beds. A few overgrown and diseased plants are also being removed so the front of the house will look much different. I'll post more pictures later.

Smoke again

Woke to a smoky world this morning. Top two pictures taken around 9 am. That second pic is the sun in a smoky brown sky. It's even worse now, a few hours later. Only the closest foothills are visible. Smoke is coming from fires on both the OR and WA sides of the Columbia Gorge this time. Fires in BC earlier this summer caused even worse air quality. My lungs hurt. Bob is struggling with a lung infection. We are waiting for relief from a stiff sea breeze tomorrow. Hope it brings some cooling, too.

Hattie doesn't care if it's smoky. She wants to chase the ball or work the sheep. Now!

Tomato plants that struggled early in the season rallied nicely and are overwhelming us with fruit. We're sharing with all the neighbors. Below is my puny red bell pepper plant. I bought it with three flowers and looks like all I'll get is three peppers, but they are looking nice as they turn red. Bob is getting a lot of jalapenos, but none of our pepper plants grow much bigger than when we buy them. Maybe because of poor soil or cool soil temperatures even though they're growing in the greenhouse - but surely these plants would be larger under different conditions?