Win a few, lose a few..

Hardy hibiscus that's been in the front bed since we moved in. It puts out large red flowers and grows happily with benign neglect..

Unhappily, the chickens have discovered my potted veggies, and devoured the chard and are pulling up my carrots as quickly as possible. I'll rig up some barrier wire tomorrow, but sure hope their eggs are tasty and worth it!!

Replacement chard- I put it in the front yard (where they cannot go). Not the same as growing your own from seed, though!

My narrow leaf senna bush is coming back!! I'd stalled on pulling it up and am glad that I did, even though it feels late. It's a great butterfly plant and will give the back back beds some height..

The Indian Blankets are about to explode in the back back, which makes up for the paltry bluebonnets this spring.

Closeups...

skateboard tableau

Yarrow peeking out

Friendly Gaillardia pulchella

My Meyer lemon blossoms smell amazing. 

Poppy seed heads

Black-eyed susan in the works? I'll know soon..

Houdini amid the Carolina snailseed. I've decided to train it to grow on trellises since it is rampant in the back corner anyway.

Dottie my vegetarian. I think she is the likely culprit for the chard destruction. The other hens dig for worms, she motors thru the greens happily, keeping my grass trim and the clover without leaves. It's a balance, I guess.

Change of scene

Quick trip to Vancouver, weather opposite that of Austin. Everything was green, moist and cold...

Stanley Park was lush, full of hostas (exotic plants here in Austin!), conifers, bee houses, tulips and ducks eating shiny shiny grass...

A pint sized community garden near downtown... Their lettuces are still going strong!

On the walk to Granville Island. After a few days of rain I got blue skies.. 

Street art under an overpass..

Oysters, mussels and clams for sale at the Public Market, an old sea crane, a weathered bouy and some amazing real estate. How'd you like to wake up every morning in those house boats?

Lost and found

Gone for two months, wandered 10 miles, across IH35. Found this afternoon, back in the family fold this evening. I'm glad for her microchip, hope she and her cat sibling can be peaceful (their friendly greeting licks and sniffs are promising). Her temporary "mom" (fed her for a while but rathered not keep her because her husband is allergic to cats) said she was a "good hunter". I plan go keep her indoors for that and many reasons: how will she do with the chickens, will she run away again, etc. She's thin but sleek, curling up with abandon, definitely not hiding under the bed...

Pumpkin blossoms..

Salad next month? The chickens have trampled my other carrots but these in a pot are going strong, along with happy chard.

Go green beans! Wild and joyful.

The back back is greening up, with volunteer indian blanket along the Mexican wire grass, bluebonnets, poppies, lambs ear, silver ponyfoot, yarrow and bulbine. Even a bit of buffalo grass is taking hold in the bare pathway..

My treat for this fall up front- waiting for the fall asters and Mexican mint marigold (top picture) and santolina (bottom pic) to fill out and bloom in Sept-Oct with cheerful yellows and purple..

Slow down, don't rush.....

Our culture is killing me- flashing images, chewing up information and imagery endlessly, voraciously, creating nonsense and anxiety 24 hours a day, all the time. I only dip my toes in briefly, occasionally, but can walk around with a hangover if I dwell too long..  A I feel my randomly aching muscles from a few days of gardening (sore ankle flexors, really??), I balance the groundedness of working with the earth with the modern impatience of "want that now now now".  (Caveat- I have a 4 year old and 8 year old. Perhaps I'm overly sensitive to the want want "greedy gimmies".. Magical thinking generally pisses me off if it is not part of a Gabriel Garcia Marquez (RIP) novel).  Getting to the point- I tore out a bunch of grass, planted new teeny plants and am inpatient to see how they do, but realize watching them grow (really, really) is a huge part of the fun..

OK- this is the house from the front (in March).. with too much St Augustine that goes sad and brown in the summer. Focus on the lawn on the right center area.. high sunshine area, always scraggly..

Grubs? Cinch bugs? In disgust I started removing sod bit by bit. It took.. a little while. I may need another deep tissue massage. I certainly need a new shovel (the old one broke mid-project, so I finished using a kid sized shovel..).

Teeny plants in a big space, no definition.. While I amended the soil with a good amount of compost, I'm still not sure what will thrive where. And I'd love to build pathways, but have issues with commitment..

Voila.. left over slats of wood from the chicken coop enterprise. They look a bit Morse-code-ish. Placed on the fly, sneaking in gardening with child entertainment ("look at Mommy sawing with a handsaw, how fun!"). They are thin, and will weather (and break) fairly quickly, but will give me and my hopping children some structured paths (and keep the rest of the space from getting trampled). Already the kids love "walking the planks". Once I see how the plants flow in the grass free area I can replace the wood with stone..

Such a blank slate- what's in there? Below are my guiding principles...

First- I'm over agaves. I have one on the other side of the sidewalk, and love a good Hotel San Jose decor, but am tired of sharp pokes. I have sensory issues, and love stroking and smelling my plants as much as I love seeing them.

Second- These plants must do ok with benign neglect (as in deep but not frequent watering after they get established). I love the idea of an edible front yard, so I threw some chard seeds as well as two peppers in the "likely to get bystander weekly Stage 2 drought lawn watering" zone. Everything else is theoretically drought resistant: salvias, santolina, gauras, fall asters, Mexican Mint marigolds, ice plants, coneflowers. I could be nervous about the new lavenders, but I have an older one (further down the no-water slope) that has held on for 5 years...

Third- get a little height: I placed an old galvanized bucket and a big (repurposed from the in-laws) ceramic pot full of mini sunflowers in the middle to add a (cheap) sculptural element while I wait to see how my salvias, lavenders, Mexican mint marigolds and transplanted volunteer Pride of Barbados's do over the next year. If they struggle, I'll have a good space to plant a central feature (perhaps even an overused agave!). If they go insane and grow huge, I'll at least have a protected sunny pocket in the middle to add an accent point...

I'm excited about the new bed, and even gave my  remaining poor St Augustine a bit of a treat this weekend by top-dressing it in compost and tossing some diatomaceous earth down to protect it from the grubs/cinch bugs/other evil humors..

Meanwhile, in the back yard....

Idyllic evening (chickens happy in freshly mown lawn..). The four girls have been well behaved, putting themselves to bed in the bigger coop, growing and being entertaining. Even my husband is entranced, taking to reading my chicken care books and getting them treats.

In the back-back. Friend or foe? I think it's a volunteer passionflower vine, prettier than the lighter green one that attempts to take over my coral honeysuckle every summer. I've decided to baby this one- placing a make-shift trellis around it to see how it grows. I love volunteers- if they go to the effort to start growing, I feel like they should be rewarded...

Mysteries of St Augustine

As I rip out his namesake grass, I just had to look up some info on St Augustine: He was bishop of Hippo Regius (present-day Annaba, Algeria) located in the Roman province of Africa. He lived around 350 AD- over 1600 years ago. He is the patron saint of brewers, printers, theologians, the alleviation of sore eyes, and a number of cities and dioceses....

Still no idea why the grass is called St Augustine though..

Here's the spot in front I have removed (mid-removal)..

So many possible reasons for the various white dead spots..

- Some of it was grubs. Being able to feed them to the chickens as treats completely transformed the experience of digging them up from disgusting to a bona fide treasure hunt.

- Some of it was silty sandy clay-ey soil. Was the soil dry because the grass was dead or vice-versa??

- Some of it might be cinch bugs, and ground pearls..

My solution was to remove a wide swatch. I plan to add compost, cover the area with weed block fabric, plant some xeriscape lovelies and add mulch.. Digging out 250 square feet of sod? Exhausting. Planting this weekend- should be fun!

The Mexican wire grass is flourishing- I've been pulling off seedheads so it will spread!

Must re-home this volunteer Pride of Barbados, squeezed up against the sidewalk..

Relocated coneflowers- with the grass gone they can reseed and spread to their heart's content!

The chickens have merged "flocks". That is, Ruby's flock of 1 has merged uneventfully with the teens. Tonight they even put themselves to bed in the bigger coop. Watching "chicken TV" has become a major pasttime around our house..

Treasure grubs- one reason Houdini has come to love me..

I thought Silverwing (on the left) was the top hen, but Houdini kept all the grubs to herself..

I thought about leaving the earthworms where I found them, but the chickens slurp them up so happily..

Even Silverwing is less skittish around me now

Ruby's eye is all better, and she roams around doing her thing..

Houdini begging for another treat.

Lush plants everywhere, but this caterpillar picks an isolated clover in the rocky section to munch on..

Cheerful

Bees swarm my borage. 

The chicken's jungle hide-out. A few last poppies- I'm letting them finish going to seed before I clear them out.

Easter pinata toy. Not a toy soldier- toy skateboarder.