Frustrated

I want to say that Portland sucks, but I'm sure it's like this in most cities. About a week ago, the city came through and trimmed the trees on our street. We don't have any street trees (mainly because I refuse to plant them because then the city decides if/when you can remove them). But they also cut down our clematis vine from that ugly pole they installed in our front planting strip a couple years ago. They just chopped it off at the ground level. How was it hurting anything? These are photos of the clematis from last year. It hadn't made it to the flower stage yet this year.

We also got a letter a couple weeks ago telling us our power would be out for a few hours for routine maintenance work. Did they say anything about the location? Nope! Well, it turns out it was in OUR FRONT YARD! 

There was not a word that they'd be working in our planting strip to give us some warning so we could relocate plants. We woke up to a strange noise and I got up and looked out the window and found them drilling a big hole in our planting strip. I didn't get a photo of it, but this is what it looked like by the time I managed to make it outside.

Really, you had to set them on the plants? You couldn't have put the huge barrels
of gravel on the other side where there were no plants?!

I do not have any recent photos of this planting strip, the plants were just starting to wake up and it was just starting to look happy again. It was pretty well covered with ferns and other plants. This is a photo from a couple years ago.

I was pretty frustrated and upset, so we simply got in our car and went RV shopping. I couldn't watch.

This is how it looked when we came home.

I'm not sure which of these crushed plants will come back. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Update later: I was able to work out some compensation for the destroyed plants. They are going to give us a $175 gift card. It doesn't begin to cover the labor and shopping time, but it should at least cover the cost of replacement plants.

Fence Half Finished

I have to be honest, I am not too pleased with Rick's right now. They did a fine job installing our fence, but their quote was for only half the fence and I didn't realize it. We had a long conversation about wanting both sides, along with the details about height and extras. I'd made a lot of compromises from the earlier quote, i.e. shorter overall height, skipping the post caps, trellis only in the section next to the house, so I wasn't surprised when the overall total was quite a bit lower. But, it turns out, they didn't quote out the whole fence. 

They finished this side of the fence then sent the final invoice and I was confused and asked when they'd be installing the rest....

Clearly, I should have looked a lot more closely at the bid and compared the total linear feet, but I was distracted and rushed to make a decision. Sigh.

Anyway, given that they only gave us a bid for half the fence, they were by far the most expensive of our quotes. So, when we do the other side after the roof and gutters are finished, we'll be going to one of the other companies.

At the last minute, we decided to dispose of the old fence ourselves. It saved us $250 and we got to pick through for the parts worth reusing.

New Fence Install Day 1

Rick's Custom Fencing and Decking started our project today. They are actually starting by doing one side this week because our neighbor was really anxious for it to be finished in time for a party, then they'll come back in a week to two to finish the other side of the yard. As a reminder, this is the style of fence we're getting for the most visible portions. 

They made short work of the old fence and had it removed in about an hour. They basically cut it into sections and then chopped the posts off at the dirt line if they didn't easily pull out.

Today they finished setting the posts in cement. Tomorrow, they'll be back to install the slats between.

We'll spend a couple hours digging through the wood pile tomorrow for portions we want to keep. I sort of like playing with salvaged wood. If we make another round of garden benches, we'll pass them onto friends.

Drip System Install

Conserva Irrigation is installing our drip system this week. We've had a few plant casualties from the trenching and channel drilling but overall the plants that survive will appreciate the reliable summer water. And once the installation is finished, I have a few more native plants to add to the yard.

Lots of New Projects

I really should be posting more frequently. We have been doing stuff. Or at least we have been hiring people to do stuff. LOL

Shortly after my last post, we discovered our roof has to be replaced. The shingles are fine, but they didn't install them correctly and there are areas with no plywood underlayment. It is VERY FRUSTRATING as I spent a long time trying to find a reputable roofer to do the installation. But since it has been more than 10 years since the installation we can't actually go after the roofer, in the unlikely event they are still in business. (Apparently, many of them set up a business, work for 10 years, then shut down the business so they don't have to deal with installation issues. Then they start up a new business with a new name. And repeat the pattern. It's really dishonest and I don't understand how they continue to get away with it.)  Rather than let it continue to rot out the roof framework we made the difficult decision to just replace the roof again.

Anyway, we decided to get an Interlock Metal Roof. The company has been in business for a really long time and I can't find bad reviews or evidence of dishonesty. With any luck, their claims that you never need another roof are true. We probably won't be here long enough to have to worry about it in any case. Unfortunately, it's late enough in the season that we may have to wait until spring before they'll be able to put it on. (They don't install roofs when it's raining.)

We also are buying LeafGuard Gutters. We had them long ago when we lived in Forest Grove and we really liked that we never had to clean them so we're getting them again. They'll be installed after the new roof is put on so we have to deal with the bad rain situation for another winter.

We also hired Conserva Irrigation to install drip irrigation for us. We've been wanting to put it in ourselves for the past several years, but it is clear we just are not motivated to do it. The new system will be installed to code and there will be a controller and we should be able to program it to run on a schedule, unlike the original plan to just attach it to hoses to make it work. They'll be starting that work in a couple of weeks.

Finally, I hope the last thing, we hired Pride and Joy Landscape, to help us get the yard back into shape.  They took away two trailers full of yard waste and everything is looking much tidier. But, I'll be honest, they did remove several plants I would have preferred they leave, but that is my fault for not marking them better, or doing a better job communicating which plants I wanted to save. After the irrigation is put in, they're going to come back out and help us spread mulch for the winter. And I'll probably move some plants around into better locations once we'll be able to water them more easily.

Before the clean up, it was hard to see but we could no longer find the path,
and many plants were growing over each other.

The columnar apple tree in front of the house had gotten a little out of control
and it was also full of wisteria vines.

I don't have a good before photo of this bed. Generally, the plants
reached the bottom branches of the apple tree and the apple tree
had many lower branches so this space is opened up quite a lot now.

So, yeah, that's a lot of upcoming work. We're spending way too much money on this house again. I haven't even added it all up and I'm sure I don't want to. But at least Jeff is working again so it won't all be coming out of savings.

Beautiful Spring Flowers

I haven't been diligent about blogging about our yard. It has been really quite lovely this spring since we've had so much rain. This is the best year we've ever had for irises; there are some we had that I didn't actually know what color they were. Obviously, we hadn't been watering them enough.

These purple irises actually used to be in our front yard, but when we planted the rain garden and shaded them, they actually migrated to the property line with our neighbor. I love the color.

These johnny jump-ups are a volunteer from the plants I put in last year. This is a good spot for them.

We got these two-tone irises from our neighbor, Donaleen. This is the first year I've seen the flowers on them. She thought they were the Iris 'Perfection' variety introduced before 1880.

I'm actually a little confused about this iris variety. I ordered several from Schreiner's Iris Gardens but this plant doesn't match any of the varieties I ordered, so perhaps it was a freebie from a neighbor. I did get a few plants from our local buy-nothing group. It looks very much like the Oui Madame variety.

I've been making a point of ordering more of the Pacific Iris varieties as they seem to do better in our shady yard. This Iris x pacifica ‘Violetta’ is looking lovely this year.

This Iris x pacifica 'Big Wheel' has been looking lovely for several weeks. 

This Iris douglasiana (Pacifica) ‘Canyon Snow’ also looked great a couple of weeks ago.

The rest of the iris plants around the yard are ready to burst into the flower so I look forward to next week as well.

This old-fashioned bleeding heart (Lamprocapnos spectabilis 'Gold Heart') has looked amazing for several weeks. All the rest of the bleeding heart plants in the hidden garden died, but this one is thriving in its location.

I have more photos and more pretty plants, but I'm tired and need to head to bed. I do hope the rain keeps up because our plants are loving it.

More Native Plants

One of our favorite nurseries, Echo Valley Natives, has lost their lease and will be closing at their current location so it gave me an excuse to go and visit. (They may reopen in a new location if they can find one.)

In March 2020, I planted a Lonicera ciliosa (orange honeysuckle) but it died pretty quickly. I've been hoping to find a replacement because I really want one of these plants for our hummingbirds. I figured it would be worth checking with Echo Valley before they closed in July. They had two little orange honeysuckles and they also had the Lonicera hispidula (pink honeysuckle) and I purchased a couple of those as well. I'm hoping between the four plants at least one of them will survive and thrive.

Of course, since I was there, I found it hard to resist getting a few unplanned natives. I got a couple Dicentra formosa (bleeding hearts), Oxalis oregana (wood sorrel) and three Lupinus polyphyllus (bigleaf lupine). Other than the honeysuckle, we don't really have room for these plants so I'll just plant them in the beds with the other plants and they can do their best to compete for space.

We have been enjoying our yard so very much this year. A little more rain would be nice as we're already feeling compelled to do some watering, but it is worth it.

The Parking Strip.

The flower bed under the black walnut.

The view of the hidden garden from the back patio.

When I was poking around my photos, I was reminded this is what the area behind the garage looked like just two years ago.

Holiday BBQ

We are really happy to be vaccinated! Jeff scheduled a BBQ for this past weekend so we spent the last couple of weeks sifting and cleaning the many piles of junk that had built up over the past year of being quarantined. I didn't really take much in the way of photos because the room themselves have not really changed; they're just cleaner.

We took two loads of trash/recycling to the dumps and dropped off one load at the charity shop. I still have one big pile of textile recycling building up on the front porch. I still have to finish sifting before I call them to pick up the pile.

We've had some wonderful weather and it was great to be able to entertain out in the backyard over the weekend. The hidden garden has been lovely and we got lots of compliments from friends that had never seen it.

We'll likely spend quite a bit of the summer visiting friends we have missed for the past year and doing day trips throughout this lovely state. The pandemic really helped us appreciate the ability to get out of the house.

More Plants

Our front planting strip got crushed in February when our neighbors moved in. Many of the plants died, but I've been surprised by the flowers that managed to survive and bloom. Here it is last week. There were still a few purple tulips that bloomed, the peony surprisingly managed to survive and one of the irises sent up a flower stalk.

Yesterday, I was totally stir crazy and I dragged Jeff off to Portland Nursery. We picked up a few more plants to try in this bed. 

Sorry, the photo is not so great. The light was not good when we finished.
I'll try to take a better photo the next time I see the bed in good light.

We're trying an Acer circinatum (vine maple) in the center. This time I put two metal stakes on either side of it so even if it's covered in snow they'll be able to see that there is something there. We also bought an Iris tenax (tough leaved iris), Gaultheria shallon (salal), and Mertensia bella (Oregon lungwort). The lungwort probably won't survive since it likely won't get watered enough once it's established. We also moved over another Polystichum munitum (sword fern) from elsewhere in the yard.

We mostly just filled in the deep wheel ruts with steer manure. We didn't spend much time trying to repair the damage. We raked it out a bit and called it good enough for now.

April Showers Bring May Flowers

We have really been enjoying our yard this year. Every week there is some new plant to enjoy.

Dodecatheon hendersonii / Shooting Star

Iris x pacific 'Big Wheel'

Parrot Tulips 'Garden Fire'

Epimedium grandiflorum ‘Lilafee’ 

Epimedium grandiflorum ‘Dark Side’

These are violas I grew from seed and planted last year!
I can't believe they survived the winter.

Jeff pruned our wisteria way back, but what is left looks nice.

This is the shady side of the front yard that we planted last year.
It looks much better now.

There are so many more photos I could share, but that's probably enough for now. I am so much happier about our yard these days. It was definitely worth the time and energy to make it a place we're proud of.