This is the first winter here in the Pacific Northwest in many years that I do not remember getting snow. With the exception of about a week it has been a very mild winter and it seems that spring is about two months early. Most days get to about 50 degrees F so we have all of the early flowers out and the larger plants are showing signs of preparing to bring out their leaves. Cece has noted that the hyacinths are already in bloom which is much too early for them. Most of the daffodils have not sprouted although a few have. The thing I have noted is that they seem to have weaker stems than normal. I wonder if that is a product of the early spring.
I have gotten a few days outside during which I have been trying to cleanup from the winter and get ready to make some more changes to the yard. The top soil we got last year is like a brick now, so I have changed to a garden mix which includes more sand (primarily) and stays softer and is easier to work.
Here in the northwest it appears that we will have an early spring. January was the warmest on record. Every type of plant seems to be in the pre-spring mode with new shoots coming out of the ground and growth buds and existing vines and limbs starting to grow.
Getting ready for the new season takes some planning. Cece has already started buying her spring plantings and I know that I need to get moving on the new raised beds or I will, once again, be behind the curve.
We have not given much thought to evergreens throughout the yard and gardens. As a result our yard really is dead and deserted. Just a few evergreens would give some winter definition to the yard. This is a topic that Cece and I need to explore more deeply as we get into the gardening mode and the weather continues to get warmer.
Now is the time for planning the gardens for the new growing season. In my case, The biggest item for me to work on is the broken concrete garden and walk liners as I mentioned in my last post. I also need to figure out just how much I am going to get done and how much new top/garden soil I will need. Last year I learned the hard way that the more expensive garden soil that my local supplier has is actually cheaper than the top soil they sell. We have had problems with the so-called top soil packing like concrete and failing to produce a satisfactory garden. We began adding peat moss to the top soil but the amount of peat moss required is significant enough to make the garden mix actually cheaper and I won’t have to do the hard work of mixing the peat moss into the top soil. Just one more hard learned lesson. My only question is why it took me so long to learn this.
Winter is definitely upon us here in Western Washington. The weather is our standard winter weather: cold but not freezing, wet but mostly slow soaking rain, and cloud covered skies. We have been fortunate that we have had a few clear days although they are a bit colder.
As I sit in our dining nook looking out onto the ravine behind our house, I am taken by the strange beauty of the bare trees and the tall trunks of the giant firs that populate the ravine. I can see Silverdale across Dyes Inlet. During the summer the foliage hides this view. I also get a glimpse of the house across the ravine which is also hidden during the summer. Last week we had a clear day that started with fog filling the ravine giving the trees a surreal appearance and made me feel like I was trapped in an alien landscape where the only life I could see were the birds and the squirrel at our feeders which were the only other life forms within my world.
Our yard has been raked and lies barren with clumps of brown or green vegetation hugging the ground like they are trying to stay warm while waiting for spring to bring them back to full life.
I do have work to do to continue building the raised bed gardens that Cece wants to line the paths through the side yard. I have a stack of broken concrete that needs to be broken into smaller workable pieces that I can stack to form the borders that hold the soil in the raised gardens. I don’t know if it is mostly the holidays or the cool, wet weather that keeps me from wanting to work outside. I suspect that it is the weather that gives me an excuse to work indoors. I do know that I need to get started preparing for spring or I will be playing catchup throughout the growing season this next year. But, at least through tomorrow (new year’s day) I will claim it is the weather and will kick back and enjoy the comfort of the house.
I have been side tracked for several months due to life catching up with me. Now I am back and trying to to get a handle on my life and on my blog/website. In October an unfortunate lightning strike affected the host and caused my site to crash. I was on vacation (I actually allowed myself to take a vacation and not do anything of a business nature which includes this website.) I have been working on and off since late October to get the site back to the condition it was in when I went on vacation in late September. I am not there yet, but it now resembles the former site. Now I have to take it to new heights.
Yesterday was the shortest day of the year. Here in western Washington that meant a very short period of daylight. Fortunatelyey not a short as Anchorage, Alaska. I spent a bit of time looking at our yard and garden and the strange beauty of the liveless trees with no leaves and the garden plots of stubs of plants and bare ground waiting silently for the spring. Of course I know that the plants are busy growing their root systems to enhance the start of the new growing season. I guess that is what I have been doing for the past few months. I feel a lot calmer and I am trying to take one thing at a time without worrying about the things that I am not working on (real estate, ebay, family projects, and church planting).
With Christmas just days away, I have been taking stock of my life, my family, and the effect the economy is having on us. I would like to believe that all is well, but like so many others, our lives are definitely affected by the economy. Years ago Peter Sellers starred in a movie, the name of which I cannot remember, where he played a simple minded man who was turned out on the street when his father died. Through a series of events he winds up as the house guest of a very wealthy person who is frequently called upon by the president for advice. His simple mind cannot see beyond the garden he had spent his life in. The irony of the story is that he makes very simple statements like the one I did a moment ago about the plants being busy growing roots during the winter season and Peter Seller’s character is credited with deep thinking and great foresight concerning the economy and the state of the government. Perhaps that is where I need to be. Keep it simple and straight forward and keep minding the garden so it can flourish when spring brings back the growing season and the beauty of the garden plants. Perhaps the spring of the new economy is just around the corner and all is well.
Our grand-daughters were over a few days ago while Cece and I spent a bit of time in the yard. The girls are 10 and 12 and joy to have around. Gillian, the 10-year old is bright and busy, never failing to come up with something to do or to explore. This particular day she took Cece’s camera and started exploring the yard and gardens taking pictures of the things that interested her. I thought I would share some of those photos. I found it interesting what Gillian chose to photograph. Here are five of the dozen or so that she took plus one showing our three local grand-daughters: Alia 12, Gillian 10, and Mikayla 2.
I finally took the time to finish the gazebo. My baby brother died two weeks ago, so I focused my energy and mind on the gazebo. The kit went together very nicely. The toughest part of the kit was the first two rafters with the compression ring. I managed to drop it and broke the prefabricated ring; so, I took it apart and repaired it before continuing. This time I used ladders as props to help me lift the first two rafters with the compression ring into place and anchor it. After that the rest of the rafters and roof deck went into place nicely.
looking through the roof framing at the trees and sky
I chose this photo to show the extent that the gazebo is located under the trees in the ravine that is immediately next to the gazebo. I would have liked to leave the roof decking off because the feel of the gazebo was great like this. Unfortunately, the weather in western Washington is such that the roof is really needed.
The hardest part of the project turned out to be the roofing. I used 30-year tab shingles. Every single sheet had to be cut to fit, which took a bit of extra time over a typical roof job. However, we are really happy with the result and Cece even commented on the appearance and the color.
Since the kit is made from cedar, we want to keep the natural appearance, so I coated everything below the roof with water sealant. Unfortunately, this will have to be an annual maintenance job.
Here is the completed gazebo.The picture to the right shows the ravine with the trees and underbrush which give the gazebo the feel of being in the forest. It is now a great spot for eating out or for quiet meditation.
For the past three years we have had a 12 ft octagonal gazebo kit taking up most of the room in our storage shed. It is a cedar Victorian gazebo kit that I bought at Costco as a present for my wife, Cece. Unfortunately, the past two summers have been spent on high priority projects away from the house. Last year I did get to prepare the site with compacted soil then 3/4″ minus crushed rock compacted and leveled into place.
My first job on the gazebo this year was to prepare the floor framing and the floor. Last week I was successful in completing the floor and soaking it with water seal as protection from rain and UV rays that will darken the natural cedar.
I used the plans I downloaded from the manufacturers site to construct the floor. Their plans use pressure treated 2×4s for the foundation and 5/4 x 6 cedar for the decking. The flooring is made in eight pie slices firmly attached together with the 5/4 decking following the octagonal pattern. I did not get all of the joints as tight as I had wanted, but I got an upcheck from Cece, so I am satisfied. Here is a photo of the flooring looking over the ravine that runs behind our house. If you look closely you can see the statue of St Francis peering over the top of the deck and partially hidden by the rhododendron.
As I expected, Cece came up with quite a few additional plants that needed a home. This meant that I had to create a new garden. Cece laid out her desire for a couple of paths which she wants lined with broken concrete walls to create raised bed gardens on both sides of the path. We agreed to only do the V formed by the junction of two paths where they meet the roman brick paving in front of the pergolas. I got the first two supplies of broken concrete from a website for our county called 2good2toss.com. I still had to break the larger pieces into appropriate sizes for the walls. I used my saw with a diamond blade to create the line along which I wanted the concrete to break. Then I used the demolition bit on my rotary hammer drill to cause the concrete to break. I succeeded in getting just enough to form the minimum walls to form this garden. I then cultivated the soil to a depth of 8 to 12 inches before adding bought top soil and cultivating the two soils along with peat moss and fertilizer. At this point I turned it over to Cece and she did the planting. Now I can get on with constructing the gazebo.
