dismantling old and building new deck,Joel with one section pulled out (also cat)

Well I was building the new deck from the back toward the front, thus dismantling the OLD deck as we got to it, here is Joel pulling a section of the old deck out (we cut it into small pieces)..

Adorable cat nap (Mitzi)

some walk around photos from May 22 2011

Here are some photos I took today while walking around the property:

Apple blossoms ..love this time of year.

looking North toward the newly enclosed garden area.

she wasn't too thrilled as I was too close to her nesting site..not my fault I like to sit by the pond.

two of my old fashioned favorites forget me not and blue violets

yes the two new hardy water lotus I bought this spring ARE alive, here is a leaf on one, the other has two leafs..I'm so happy..rest of my pond plant order still has not arrived (the other end of pond has 10 water lilies also doing well but they have been there a long time)

can't see them very well but there are flowers on the little apple tree too, just not as many as the other trees.

one of the fountains in our jungle..

John and Jessica's apple tree next door, birdhouse on property line has occupants but they are shy

here is where we are replacing the damaged lattice fence between us and neighbors with salvaged picket fence, I like it better than the lattice here (used the damaged lattice around food garden), the crab apple is one I salvaged when we had our housefire as is the little baby lilac..This is how far I got with the salvaged pickets, can't finish until I buy 4 more panels ..when the truck is repaired.

got more lattice up

Well the lattice around the food forest garden project is coming along nicely, I got nearly all of it done including a new 8' long 2' deep arbor on the east side (pond side) that I just planted 2 gold clematis vines on today..

I had 19 bags of bark, wood chips swept up from the woodshed this winter so today I put cardboard and bark down to cover 80 square feet area along the lattice fence on the s and w sides..till I ran out of bark.

also planted all the odds and ends of saved or given to me seeds that I had from friends or my own gatherings from last fall, flower seeds..and put them in the garden, along the lattice or out front by the road and in front of the house..if they grow it will be beautiful.

even mowed the lawn for the first time today..seems like spring has finally arrived ..

salvage is a wonderful thing

Well we had some horrible wind storms this fall winter and spring, and they did some fence damage here and at our son's house..here mostly picket fences that will be put back up after the posts are replaced that were damaged..but at Joel's he wants the fence down, as it isn't really useful to him, and it is 6' high lattice..some of the lattice is damaged but some is reusable..so I'm planning on reusing it all to fence in my food forest garden in the back to protect it from critters a little more.

I began taking down the fence panels, posts and 2x4 framwork a few days ago, but it got cold and I had to stop.

Well today it was warmer so I got to work on hauling it to our house to build the lattice framework around the food garden.

the garden will require 6 8' sections on all 4 sides minus some gates here and there and some arbors.

I have the west side done, it is rough as some of the lattice was in bad shape..the bottom 2' of the posts were damaged but I was able to salvage the top 6' so burying them 2' in the ground I have 4' above ground so my new lattice fence around the food garden will be approx 4' high all the way around, some longer posts will have some birdhouses on them.

On the west where it is done, there will be brambles climbing up into the lattice, raspberries lots of kinds and blackberries..now that the lattice is up I'm THINKING of maybe putting cardboard and mulc on the OUTSIDE of the lattice to make a bed on both sides of it.

On the south where the lattice is also nearly finished will be blueberries and service and june berries, mostly outside the garden south of the lattice, so it won't be shading them..still have to figure what to put on the shady side of the south lattice as there is room to plant some things there..the soil is acidic in this area...thinking of putting the cardboard, mulch, etc on the north side to kill off the grasses there too and maybe do some planting on the shady side.

haven't done the rest of the garden yet, but have hauled a bit of materials back there to work on it tomorrow and any other nice days this week (but  i'm sore (5 weeks from surgery) and sunburned))..I still have several panels of lattice to remove at my sons as well as posts to haul, etc..and of course all the picket fence to repair as well, that might wait a while..the panels are down and stacked until I can get new posts in.