How Does Your Garden Grow?

      Quite nicely, thank you. August will mark the beginning of our tenth year here in Fuquay, which means both Donna and I have lived here longer than either of us has lived in any other one place in our lives. Our house may be tiny, but we've got a great, roomy lot, full of trees and bordered by some thriving green spaces (our back yard descends to what used to be a farm pond, and what is now a lovely wetland with frogs, turtles, deer walk-throughs, and all manner of happy, chirpy wildlife).
      Slowly--one corner, one perennial, one fruit tree at a time--we've been building the yard (organically!) into the peaceful haven that head gardener Donna was able to envision when we first saw the place. It's been a lot of work, but the results are increasingly rewarding. Donna is the true gardener in the family; for her, the actual work in the dirt is an end in itself, green therapy for the daily pressures of her job. I'm not a gardener so much as the hired help, and my gratification is delayed. For me, the digging and planting and weeding are pretty much a chore. The real pleasure comes as the plants mature and fill in, and I finally get to see in front of me what Donna saw in her head all along. I highly recommend it.
      I've posted some pictures at Flickr, including a couple of "time lapse" shots that show how things have progressed over the years. It's pretty remarkable to see how far it's come when I look back at the older pics.
      We're not at all interested in having a "lawn," by the way, though that's what many homeowners seem to obsess over. Grass holds little interest for us, and the mowable bits of the property are probably 75% weeds. It's all green when you mow it. The plants are the thing!