Fall front yard, year 2

The 10′ sunflowers outside our front fence had run their course — stooped over and drying out, their lives completed. They did WONDERFULLY and looked terrific, but it was time to cut them down and put up the next season of plants. Along with their removal, I pulled down the vines that had been very clumpily growing up the fence. They just weren’t blooming like I’d hoped (probably our historic drought) and many were wrapped around the trunks of the sunflowers, so they were shredded during the sunflower dismantlement, so out they all went, as well.

What to replace them with? I wanted to try something different, so went shopping with Ivy in tow for ideas. My eyes landed on crotons. What a wonderfully varied plant, and this is their season. So a couple trips and home I came with 5 nice ones in 3-gallon buckets, ready to go.

They wound up on the INSIDE of the fence. I still haven’t figure out to put outside where the sunflowers were, so right now it’s just a trench of old peat moss and garden bed soil, drying out in the sun. One idea I’m toying with is some coleus and vincas. I bought plenty of both, but wound up gutting the little flower bed where the fig tree is, and planting them there, so the outside gate is still open for suggestions. I may just get some more crotons and put them outside as well.

If you have ideas, please email me!

Other little pretties I picked up were 3 hanging baskets of purslanes (called “Dolly Parton” plants because they bloom from 9 to 5), a gorgeous ice plant, a lovely basket of happy healthy potato vines that are a giant ball of perky yellow green hanging from the bird feeder, and a “tree form” bougainvillea that’s trained up about a 4′ tall stick. All of these are sun-lovers, and all but the bougainvillea are either sedum or succulent type plants, which hopefully bodes better than the petunias (bless their hearts) did in the hanging baskets.

The begonia and caladium corner of the front yard is almost done with (dogs, weather, drought, season) and so the three hydrangeas which seem to have surived will be transplanted into that spot soon, along with probably also one of the larger “vanilla strawberry” paniculatas I bought this summer. They are still being babied in pots on the front porch.

So, this marks one year of actual yardwork for me. I’ve come a long way from my black thumb days of killing houseplants, and have learned to accept when things aren’t working out, or that Mother Nature doesn’t cooperate very well (I’m about to lose another pygmy date palm in this drought, after losing one to the freeze this February — probably an example of BOTH things I’ve learned). The most important thing I’ve learned is that cycles exist. One round of your plants will come and go, and another is right around the corner. Or one set of plants may go dormant while others are coming to life. It’s nice to know that there IS more around the corner, and that I can mix and match and try things out and that is “O-K.”

So, here are some photos of the fall front yard, for now. There’s more work to be done, but I think this is a good start.