Landscape Plan: Front yard Design thoughts

Right now my front yard is what you call a "Gardner's garden." I don't take offense to that - I love plants. The problem is that the perennial beds are just too big for me to take care of and I can't afford to hire a landscape company for regular maintenance. I'd love to satisfy my gardening with smaller more manageable beds and make my front entry way more inviting.

The Landscape designer came back to inventory all of my plants and so we discussed the vision for the front yard.

Here they are:

1. Fix the front stoop: Existing brick stoop that the previous owners either did themselves or hired someone who made a lot of shortcuts. Since we've moved in, it's been falling apart and we have to fix it properly. Structurally bad, it's also too small and the step is too high. The idea is to make it a 2-step stoop.

Our crumbling front stoop - priority #1

The LD also assured me it could be made bigger without compromising the life of the Oakleaf hydrangea next to it, which I wish to keep.

2. Make a courtyard entrance/walkway: Right now I love the canopy the crabapple gives to this space and my bench underneath it feels like a courtyard ... somewhat. I told the LD I wanted a courtyard and he really felt that utilizing the L-shape area would be a perfect place for this. He agreed and is making me a plan to incorporate a courtyard with my perennial bed that is under the crabapple - which is pretty and low maintenance.

Larry, Darryl & Darryl and the future courtyard

3. Viburnums-a-bye-bye: I love Larry, Darryl, & Darryl, my 3 Judd Viburnums, but the new courtyard design will eliminate the 2 soldiers standing guard near the front door to make the door more visible. Larry can remain.

4. Spruce, another bye bye: The Spruce by the road had the plum tree in front and so it has a lot of dead areas. The LD said he's like to see it go because it's unsightly and is in poor health. Once that tree is gone, there will not be much need for all the groundcover growing underneath. It's low maintenance, but I'm getting invasive groundcovers coming in which is making it high maintenance. The plan is to grass up this area. That way, the bed behind it can be seen from the road and it is a pretty perennial bed.

The lonely, spindly, spruce

5. Shared Sunny Garden, Simplified: My neighbor and I garden the shared lot line between our houses. My side is always a mess and I can't stand it. I like the 2 lilacs, the magnolia and the beautyberry (of which I both planted). Other than that ... yuck. Our LD agreed that this area needs to be simplified and he will tackle that with the understanding that 1/2 belongs to my neighbor. I also have a thug in that garden - bishops weed - which the only solution to eradicate is Round-Up...

A hodgepodge of mess

I was happy to learn that I am growing some plants he said were difficult to grow - pulmonaria, corydalis, and the beautyberr, that my 2 trees (magnolia and dogwood) have frost damage (no disease), I planted my dwarf blue spruce too deep (re-plant), and that my spicebush may be right on or over the lot line (ARGH!).

Magnolia x butterflies

My magnolia tree that I planted as a twig about 3 years ago has finally produced its first bloom. I can't tell you excited I was to see it!

Empty House

I've been given a gift: to see what it would be like to not have my husband and baby for 4 days. The only positive point of this experience is .... my house has remained clean.  Other than that, I miss my family terribly.

In the baby bouncer -  he likes it more now than he did as an infant.

Matt is, as we speak, running the Nashville 1/2 Marathon, and he took Wesley to Nashville for the 4-day trip to visit his parents. Since I'm 33 weeks along, we decided I should man the fort stay home. This is his 2nd 1/2 marathon, and he's been training for this one for the last 16 weeks. I always knew he'd be leaving and taking our baby with him, but it wasn't until they walked away from me at the airport to go through security that I lost all control of my emotions and stood there sobbing my eyes out. I never thought I'd be so emotional; I always told Matt I was the type of mom who could pack off her kids to stay with the "southern grandparents" for a long weekend, but I guess I'm not.

Snuggling in mommy & daddy's bed.

Once they got there safely, I did feel better and had a prenatal massage, took a nap, and went to swim class. Matt reported often that Wesley was a dream on the plane, not scared of his parents, sociable, lovable, what more could you ask. Day 2, I woke up at 9AM, with my mom I went to an estate sale and then lunch at Bien Trucha, afterwards running some errands and then having dinner with a friend. After all that baby-free time, I decided, "OK this was fun to have 2 days off, when are they coming back?" Not until Monday morning. So the plan is now to go to Lake Geneva and relax, get manicures, and eat out some more.

I'm sure on Monday, when Wesley is demanding all of my time and I have not one minute to myself, I'll realize that I was given this gift of 4 days of freedom and that I should relish it while I have it. I won't have an empty house again for another 18 years.

And a tree came a tumbling down ...

The design plan for our backyard won't be ready for another 4-6 weeks, but we know it involves removing the small maple tree, so we went ahead and took it down this weekend.  This will be our 5th tree we have taken down since moving in (2 poorly sited apple trees, 1 diseased service berry, and 1 diseased plum tree). I'm a tree hugger, so all this tree removal is throwing me for a loop.

I was pretty sad to see it start to get taken down, but behind this large bramch was another one that was completely dead. In fact, there were a lot of dead branches to this tree. Our LD said it wasn't healthy and competing with the enormous sugar maple behind it for water.

When we got to the roots, we were surprised that there were not that many and spreading out - typical of maples. Looks like the root ball was still intact from when it was planted. The wire holding it all in was still there and the poor tree never had a chance.

 Wesley woke up from his nap in time to take a few pictures with our woodsman, my grandpa - "tree remover extraordinaire"

My little talker, can I brag a little here?

Can I brag about my kid a little? I know that you're not supposed to and no one wants to hear how little Jimmy can do algebra and he's not even 3 years old yet, while your kid is standing there picking his nose.  But I didn't care when I saw other babies crawling at 5 months (he crawled at 10 months) or walking at 9 months (he walked at almost 14 months) and had a mouth full of teeth (he's really late with teeth), but now it's my turn!

Boy can my kid talk!

I'm not going to say he's an advanced talker, at the doctor's office for his 18 month check up they just wanted to make sure he could go beyond "Mama" and "Dada." I told them yes, he says a lot including his first 3-syllable word "Basketball" and he can string 2-3 words together like "Nana home car." And that was all I needed to say. The doctor said his speech was fine and no need for intervention or assessment. But you know there's that tiny part of me that wanted to ask, "But is he advanced?" (more like, "Can't you see I'm pleading for you to tell me my son's advanced so I can tell all my family and we can all brag.")

I vowed I would never be one of those mom's, but I am marveled by my kid's speech (and so is Matt, it's not all me).

By the time he was one-year-old, he could say:  mama, dada, tat (cat), and fan. And he understood the concept of "hot" and said it.

By the time he got to 16-18 months old, his vocab flourished. He knew and could say everyone in the family - Nana vs Nani, Nonno vs Papa, Big Uncle (my brother) became "Guncgunc". He could say and knew the difference between up and down, said 2-3 words strung together (Nana home, Dada train), and he knows if something was plural: "two boom" (two balloons, even if there were 4 of them). He also understood the concept of "hide" - at breakfast he took a pen, put it under a piece of paper and said, "Pen hide."

Now that's he's 20 months old, he's just repeating about everything we say and improving on his vocab. Instead of saying "down" he'll say "downstairs," he knows all of his balls (booball (football), hocky ball (soccer ball), baseball, golfball, tenniball, basketball). I even taught him "Basketball hoot" (Basketball shoot) and "dribble basketball.". He loves going to the park: "park pay" (Park play) and going on the "big yide" (big slide). And he just started saying his own name "Veffy" (Wesley) - he says his W's like V's and he can't say his S's. He loves "Mi mow" (Micky Mouse) and "Doofy" (Goofy) and "Pooh Bear." I'm just amazed every day how much he learns and says.

Ok, I'll stop now.

30 weeks

I have not been chronicling this pregnancy, which I'm pretty sure if typical when you're busy running after a 20-month old. But I am saddened that Matt and I haven't even taken any photos (he was my photographer with Wesley). I snuck in this picture on March 25th (28 weeks) when Matt was painting the baby's room and we were all up there offering support bugging him.

I feel like we still have so much to do to prepare for this new baby. We haven't even cracked open our Bradley Birthing notes and we're still hoping to go natural (i.e. no epidural) for this birth too. At the very least, I need to re-read Ina May's book for inspiration and confidence.

Happy Easter!

We had a great Easter weekend, and beautiful weather to match!

Friday we painted our Easter eggs, Wesley loved plopping the eggs into the different color dyes (which by the way purple, red, and pink all turned out pink. Next year we're using food coloring.)

Mini Monster Easter Eggs

 Saturday, we went to Cantigny for an Easter Egg hunt, but we got there too late. It didn't matter because it was beautiful to be outside and Wesley had fun running around and seeing the baby animals. He did not, however, enjoy seeing the Easter Bunny.

Sunday morning, we went to church and our UCC congregation is small enough that we didn't have to sit in a gym for Easter (like we did at our previous Catholic Church).  When we came home, we found out that the Easter Bunny left a basket on the front stoop and easter eggs in the back yard. After which we had Easter Brunch at a local Country Club and then the evening at my grandparents for a light dinner. 

Another basketball?!

Refinancing the 'ol split level: Part 2

I last wrote that we decided to refinance our house in February ... and we finally signed all the papers yesterday. It took almost 2 months to get everything in order since we had a major hiccup in the process: appraisal value.

I was told that to refinance, we needed to have 20% equity in our house; so that even if the value fell, the fact that we put 20% down in 2005 and paid seven years of mortgage principle (including an extra $150 of principle a month) should cushion any devaluation. Well, that was the theory. The reality was that the appraiser had a personal vendetta against me (there could be no other explanation) and valued our house so low we could not refinance.

I received and read the report late one night when Matt & the baby were asleep, my eyes welling up as I tried to decipher what went wrong. One of the comps was a house I had been watching - it had sold when we bought in 2005 for the same price, and recently sold again for less but for a good amount - and I thought it would help our value. Instead the appraiser said it's remodeling was far superior than ours -- by $50,000 -- and chose to comp our homes to small tiny ranches with falling down detached garages. Why? Because we live in a split level and we can only count our main floor and top floor as livable square footage. Our family room space - 1/2 grade below - does not count, and neither does that bathroom. So our home was being compared to others with only 1300 sq feet of livable space, 1 bathroom + basement, even though ours has 1300 sq feet + 1/2 grade below family room, 2 baths + basement. Crazy.

So after a lot of crying all through the night, I learned that you can appeal an appraisal if you can find serious fault. And I did. All 3 comps were in a different school district, had smaller total square footage, and 2 were not remodeled as nice as ours. They also had detached garages and much lower assessed values. After talking to our lender, he suggested I write this up and present it with some new comps found by a realtor, which I did. One week later, we received word that our value was raised by $30,000 and we were cleared to refinance. I felt the surge of victory run through my veins as the new report came through.

I know that Matt and all my family were thrilled for us -- not only for the saving money aspect - but because it was all I could talk about for weeks and they were sick & tired of hearing about it. But honestly, when I quit my job I not only made it a priority to raise my children but to help out as much as possible financially (I can't really make money, but I can sure help us save it). This refinance was a huge endeavor for me, I wasn't going to let some _______________ [insert any unkind word about appraiser here] ruin it for me!

In the end, our monthly payment is now $30 less a month but it includes the real estate taxes and home insurance: a savings of $5400/year!

Landscape Plan: Backyard design thoughts

My initial meeting with the landscape designer went well. We talked about what we could do in the backyard - incorporating my wishes into this already small space. We had some constraints, the existing maple tree and exit from our basement, that seemed to pose problems. All of that was clearly taken care of in this initial talk.

Initial backyard plans:

• Remove Maple tree: The small maple planted by previous owners has shallow roots and is planted far into our yard. Any plans for expanding the existing deck, or adding a patio was stunted ebcause of the tree. At first, this tree was a non-negotiable because of it's pretty shape, but we decided it can go and now we can expand our patio to this point. In addition, the tree competes with the huge Sugar Maple behind it for water, so it's not in the best health. 

 

The tree to come down

• Remove Deck, Replace with Softscape: The deck was off the dining room (and now off the kitchen with our new window configuration). It was over a sloped grade in our yard, as well as the exit from the basement (per code). We figured this was our only option. Not so. We are going to remove the deck and plant a softscape along the new dining room window. At the corner of the house we can put up evergreen screening or a specimen tree.

The deck to go BYE BYE, and area for patio

• Add patio: Off the new kitchen exit, we are going to build a nice stoop that leads to a terraced patio (terraced because of the sloping grade). It will extend out into our yard and wrap around. Along it we will have perennial beds and our water fountain. It should be big enough for some eating, lounging and a chiminiea.

• Utility Pole: Climbing hydrangea 'Moonlight' for this shady area

Climbing hydrangea 'moonlight'

• Existing garden beds: To be determined. The plants need to be inventoried and a new bed designed. The only plant non-negotiable is the Pagoda Dogwood.

• Vegetable Garden Design: Where our existing patio is will be a new vegetable garden "potager" style with brick pavers throughout to walk and raised beds. A paver walkway into the yard will leave small areas open for thyme and other groundcover.

Patio & veg garden to be new Potager

I am giddy with excitement!

Landscaping Plan: To do it all or not?

Our house is almost completely remodeled, so now we can move our focus on to the yard - specifically the back yard.

I love to garden, as is evident by my gardening blog, but I'm not formally trained and I have almost zero knowledge of design. That said, I also find it difficult to see past the issues in my own yard (it's easier to critique others, right?).  We've been living in our current home for seven years, and have been throwing around several ideas of how to make our backyard into a place where we can relax  (seating), garden (both ornamental and vegetable), and enjoy our kids (family friendly). The constraints of the yard  -- namely the awkward maple tree, the confined space of the screened in porch, and the crumbling patio -- have held us back. We have a vision (private, courtyard, potager) but can't seem to get there.

The solution? Hire a landscape designer.

My thoughts on hiring a landscape designer, over a landscaping company, was that the designer could work for me, with me, and with our garden in my best interest. I'm paying for the design, not each individual boulder they decide to plop into the landscaping. He is going to inventory all my plants and use them as much as possible - maybe even leaving them if they are sited well and growing good. He knows I love to garden, but that with two small children my available free time is limited. I'll get small softscapes in the backyard in which to garden, but the overall maintenance will be less fussy than the "gardener's garden" I have now.

I initially wanted the design for the backyard, as my front yard seemed to be doing well and the previous owners designed it already. The only area in need of immediate attention was our stoop where a lot of shortcuts were taken and now the stoop is falling apart (the designer pointed out all the issues and exactly how to rebuild it properly). So between a new stoop design and the backyard, that was all.

Then I took a good look at my front yard.

We only briefly talked front yard, but the designer noted a few things that were not to scale, not sited properly, etc etc. I looked at the massive circle un-designed perennial garden in my front lawn that I have to constantly manage. I looked at the center garden in full sun where a new ground cover has taken over. In short, the front yard is too much work for a mom of 2 kids under 2. I decided that a small "gardener's garden" in the backyard is all I need to be "horticulturally" satisfied, and the front can be handed over to the designer. So now he can design the entire 50 x 130 lot I live on.

So there. We're getting a whole new design to our yard and when we have the time (and money) we can tackle each area piece by piece, dollar by dollar.

Gastro Society Spring Dinner

Another meeting of the Gastro Society occurred this weekend. Our Gastro Society is ... 4 couples, the men cook, the women relax, and wine flows freely until late in the night.  We had to miss the last Gastro in the Fall because my morning sickness was in full throttle. We can't let that happen again.

So the inspiration for Saturday's dinner was Asian/ March Madness and here was our lovely dinner courtesy of 4 great guys chefs.

Appetizer: Goat cheese, apples, potatoes, and beets

Salad: Pumpernickel, pea shoots with enoki mushrooms and sauteed asparagus & hen of the wood mushrooms.

Main course: Surf & Turf (Filet mignons and seared tuna). Served with asian bok choy, lotus root, and asparagus

Dessert: melon 2 ways -- a sorbet and balled melon with japanese basil. Not pictured: the homemade chocolate truffles.