 | ||
| Old-field toadflax |
“Let’s
call it Toadflax Farm," I said to Tim, "because of the bushels of old-field toadflax I yank out
every spring.” (Old-field toadflax is an attractive, airy wildflower/weed with sweet
little lavender-blue blooms and a germination rate close to 120%.)
We surveyed our transformed
front yard, now a maze of raised beds and Grow-Bags festooned with miles of
toe-grabbing bird-netting. The faint dead-animal stench of the soured milk we’d
poured on the Grow-Bag tomatoes (for the calcium, that’s why) wafted past on
the evening breeze. “More like ‘Green Acres,’” my husband replied.
 |
| Toadflax Farm, scoffers notwithstanding |
Hmph. My enthusiasm cannot be dampened
this early in the season. I go walkabout every morning, camera and harvesting
colander in hand, looking for new stuff. Yesterday, almost all the beans had
sprouted where the day before only one bent stem could be seen. The peas and
strawberries dribble in. (I’ve learned you have to plant a hell of a lot of
shelling peas to bring in even a modest crop. I don’t really have the room, so
mostly I eat them raw as I pick them.) Baby tomatoes and cucumbers proliferate.
Thirty out of 31 peanuts sown are up. The potatoes will need their first hilling
this afternoon.
I am so psyched. I’d rather be puttering around my own yard than working
gainfully, or blogging. April, ever one of my favorite months, has outdone
herself this year.
*****
Now let’s move on from paean to
paving.
Open, flat patios work fine for
extending the deck or house out into the garden; they look a bit forlorn,
though, when floating on their own out in the yard. Some clients of ours
envisioned a curving floored space, complete with firepit, for outdoor
entertaining; close to but not abutting the back of the house; and viewable
from inside the house. Accordingly, they hired a mason (who managed to pave
over only one irrigation head in the process: good thing Tim’s the Leonardo da
Vinci of integrated landscape systems). The two-dimensional reality left
something to be desired, however. In an attempt to provide the missing j’en ne sais quoi, they tethered the
floating patio to the house with a straight and narrow flagstone path at a 94° angle from the bottom
step. Didn’t help much.
A friend recommended Fitzgeralds
Gardening. When consulted, we suggested a seating wall--so-called because the top of the wall is wide and stable enough to sit on--to enclose the patio, and a wider, more meandering path.
And that’s what we did.
This was in the days before we
had a digital camera, so the work-in-progress photos have disappeared into the
black recesses of the office closet, probably never to see the light of day
again. But I did manage to salvage the before-and-afters for your edification.
What a difference a wall makes!
 |
| "Floating" patio |
 |
| "Floating" patio, grounded |
As does the curved as opposed to
stick-straight path. (Notice that instead of skirting the clump of three crape
myrtles, we routed the path through it. When the trees leaf out, passing among
them will make visitors feel more like they’re on their way to a destination. It’s a subtle, subliminal
design trick, but it really works.
 |
| "Floating" patio tethered better |
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| "Floating" patio tethered, barely |
Low walls help define garden
rooms, too. One lady asked Tim and me to impose civility on part of her wild-ish
back yard, and give her a reason to leave the screened porch. Here’s what we
came up with.
 |
| Garden room from the rear |
 |
| Garden room from the front |
 |
| Low edging wall |
Have bermed planting areas that
could use some retaining? Need an edging that prevents lawn from creeping where
you don’t want it to go? Dream of stopping the lawn guy from slowly decreasing
your grassed area by pretending a weed-whacker is an edging tool? A low wall might just be
the answer to all these landscaping conundrums.
 |
Retaining wall,
take one:
après ça, le déluge
|
In this age of proliferating
concrete wall-block systems, anyone with a reasonably strong back and knees can
build a low wall. I keep emphasizing “low” because anything higher than 18 to
24 inches requires battening. If the word “battening” means nothing to you, don’t plan
on going higher than three tiers, four as an absolute maximum. (Wall blocks run to around four inches in height.) For actual
retaining walls—designed to hold back tons of soil—hire a professional. Ask for
references, and check them. We have a
friend who contracted with his mulch provider (?) to install a five-foot high,
115-foot long retaining wall above a pond. The first-time wall builders had no idea they needed to batten such a structure; ergo, the first heavy rainfall toppled several sections and undercut
the base in places, because it was improperly done.
Oh, dear.
Should you undertake a
do-it-yourself wall project, the local home-improvement emporium is a good
place to start. (Here are links to the relevant webpages for Lowes and Home Depot.)
They stock all you’ll need in the way of materials and tools. Selection has
improved tremendously from the days of one-size-fits-all concrete lozenges,
with more shapes, colors, finishes (i.e., tumbled, smooth, scored) and price
ranges to choose from.
 |
| More Lowes wall blocks & pavers |
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| Some Lowes wall blocks & pavers |
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| Paver company catalogs |
If you’re not a DYI kind of
person, visit a brick- or stone-yard instead. In the Oak Island/Southport area,
check out Bianchi’s Brickyard. Proprietor Dave
Bianchi is a master mason, which is evident the second you pull up in front of
the place. (Those of us who watched it never cease to marvel at the transformation
of a nondescript vinyl-sided house set toward the back of a weedy lot to the
lovely building and grounds of today.) Tim and I source materials for our
projects there, because Dave carries the more up-scale Anchor Block's Holland Pavers (a division of Metromont Materials)
and Belgard lines that can be tailored to the
particular job, and provides tons (haha) of professional advice.
 |
| The orange wall; or, Caveat emptor |
Speaking of professional advice,
here’s some: choose colors carefully. Err on the side of neutral greys and
tans. One client chose the wall block herself for an installation we did. She
meant to pick up a subtle pink tone in the bricks of the house, but she didn't have a spare to take with her to Lowes for comparison. Although you
can’t really see it in its full glory in this picture, what she got was an orange wall.
*****
Must run. Oak Island, it seems,
has lost its deer immunity: my ‘Red Zebra’ baby tomatoes and the top of the
plant were gone yesterday morning, and poor ‘Black Trifele’ now nothing but
a stalk. So we’re off to Lowes to investigate fencing options. No, a low wall
won’t do.
Thanks for dropping by.
Kathy
P.S.—Welcome to Laura, décor addict,
artist and musician, who arrived as GFTGU’s 15th follower this
morning. I’m glad you’re here.
