. . . .At Last!!

 Today is the day, HURRAY! Hard to decide which day I was awaiting with more anticipation: the house closing or dirt delivery. Whatever, I am thrilled that Christmas  Garden Day has arrived. Woowoo!!! This pile of luscious black soil was dumped last night around 6pm. I threw the driver a kiss. 

The size of the dump truck was huge and I expected an equal size load of soil, but this may just be the first of many. I expect it will just fill one bay of the three sides of the bed. The interior depth is about 24" and crushed rock is already filling a couple of those inches. Drainage is important, as well as the stability of the beds. When it is dry, our 'soil' is concrete and when it rains a lot it turns to mashed potatoes. I loathe putting down rock in any garden but needs must, as they say in Britain. 

In the meantime I am kinda liking this idea that I saw on Pinterest for keeping garden tools handy and out of the tiny one car garage. This side of our garage is a desert and rarely sees any sun or water. I hope the brooms will be alright there. We have a ton of leaves and tree blooms falling on the patio this Spring so sweeping is a regular task (until we get a leaf blower, which I dislike for the noise it makes). Dave promised to wash and paint this pallet...and I promised to get some hooks to hang small tools like trowels, hedge shears, tree pruners and secuteers.

  

Speaking of Pinterest, I saw this cute homemade garden pagoda, and tried to assemble one from the debris left from the patio brick. ha! I await one good wind to topple it, hopefully on top of the voracious big fat seedling eating critters that have attacked my efforts.

 Mustn't grumble, I have a good bunch of basil already sprouting its second set of leaves, and loads of zinnia, which seem to sprout overnight. Love their enthusiasm.

 

So many plants ready to plunk in.

 Four clematis, and an equal number of coneflowers, some swiped from my previous house...and a whole tray of asters, which I never have had in my garden, but aren't they sweet?

Home Depot had a huge (on sale )selection of tremendously large hydrangea, so I went nuts and got eleven. Some white, some pink, some blue-ish and then the new selection this year, Bloomstruck. A white turning pink turning purplish mophead variety.

Still unplanted in the garden is my darling little fig tree, which is going great guns in the galvanized pot. We relocated this from the previous house too, before it had its current leaves. They grow really fast and I am crazy about having one, and maybe more if I can find the variety I want.
We are sooooo glad to have the space, the trees, both the sun and the shade and landscaper to do all the hard work. I keep saying that now that I am 70, I deserve it. Dave does too, even tho he is a mere youngster at 63.

 Must mention my two pots of Empress Wu hosta. I ordered one and it arrived with the main stem broken at the base. So I had them replace it, and lo and behold the roots had news for me. Two sprouts appeared even before the replacement arrived. These are reputed to be the largest hosta yet. O boy!