Mary, Mary Quite Contrary,

How does your garden grow?

My garden grows like a mo-fo. word up. (Mary aint the only contrarian around here these days...)*

And contrary to the nursery rhyme filled with "with silver bells and cockle(ahem?) shells and pretty maids all in a row", ours is now filled with chrysanthemums, dalias and gold crest. And, hello? OF course pretty maids. Not the cleaning kind though. pul-eeeze!

Saturday Katie and I had to entertain ourselves as Manus had to work away another Saturday.

I told him, Manus, your boss is a real ass. A real slavedriver. A real party-pooping stick in the mud. A real turdburgler.

Then he reminded me that he works for himself so I said... "yeah, I know." what was his point?

I have taken to gardening like I have to all my other crafty, hobby, pet-projects: I'm all in, gung-ho, jumping in with both feet, I am a gardening gardener who gardens. I am out there every day, watering, weeding, "tending to my flock"- if you will. I am passionate, I am dedicated, I am motivated, and just like all my other projects, there isnt a hope in hell that I am ever going to see this one through..

Currently in my "active" file are two half-finished cross-stitch patterns, THREE books that I have started and grown tired of before reaching the end, half-used tubes of Bob Ross oil paints, 6 books of B.R. painting tutorials and one canvas with painted sky and a big black blob in the foreground (shadowing - always getting stuck in the blocking part...). I was big into scrapbooking for half a second. Wanna get Manus riled up? Pull out our honeymoon album. It is fantastic, if I do say so myself. Until I quit three-quarters of the way and put it up on the top shelf. Manus asks if Im ever going to finish it and I tell him honestly -

no f***ing chance.

And oh yeah, p.s., someday this blog will just POOF! be gone... Don't kid yourself into thinking that I will keep this up. I dont know when it will happen, I just know that it will. You have been forewarned. Start the counselling now.

Because I know that I have this endearing little quality, I do take precautionary steps. My garden project was limited to the small dog-poop patch in the front of the house. And, though I had visions of a very different landscape when I went over to the DIY and garden centre, I allowed myself only to purchase plants that were on sale (and were cheap to begin with). Although I wanted the tiller that I saw the other day in a garden shop, I didnt let myself spend the money, knowing that someday quite soon that very tiller will be a discarded tool collecting cobwebs in the corner of our shed - not to mention, taking up precious tenant space.
This means that all the digging and tearing up of grass and unearthing rocks was done with these two hands and one small trowel and one of those 3 pronged hand spade thingys. Katie helped. We felt very mother-earthy. Very "one with nature". It was one of those "get your hands dirty, roll around in the mud, play Hide-the-dirt-in-your-ear, what does mud taste like?" kind of days. Well, for one of us it was. (me)

We also played "Dirt, Rock, or Dung?" as we dug in the former puppy potty. I can only hope that what is still embedded under my nails is the former rather than the latter.

Sadly, I have low hopes for the success of our garden. What do I know about growing? I killed a ficus tree. A plastic one. Why do I think that chrysanthemums, dalias and gold crest can grow together in harmony? Do they require the same amount of water? Of sunlight? Of plant food? When I was in the garden store, I saw a flyer talking about "testing your soil" before beginning to plant. That didnt sound like fun, so I didnt do it. Besides, after you take out all the rocks there isnt much soil left so I just filled the bed with compost and planted into that.

I could go out there every day and give the flowers some CO2 therapy... I can just ramble on and on and on, talking a lot and saying very little. It seems to be working with Katie... she is growing like a bad weed. If I did that though, Id have no endless, pointless rambling left to blog with... (audible sigh actually heard from within my computer)

We seem to be doing something right in the backyard at least... we have new growth!



Then and now. Remember the bare patch (circled in red)?

*As I believe that the children are our future, we should teach them well and let them lead the way. Therefore when I find something of educational value I will stick it way down here at the end, out of the way of the blathering nonsense above. The nursery rhyme, Mary, Mary quite contrary, is actually about Mary, the daughter of King Henry VIII. You can learn about it here.http://www.rhymes.org.uk/mary_mary_quite_contrary.htm