...and make our garden grow...

I've gotten a lot of work done on my garden! I still feel like it's kinda bare--it's hard because it'll take until long after we've moved away for it to fully fill in. BUT I'm very happy with the progress of in-ground perennials. I think I just need to pot up some brighter (but obviously still shade-loving) annuals to add some peeks of color. I've been trying to select plants (and planters) that pop against the dark brick of the building, and this also means they'll show up nicely when they're in shadow.

I'm limited not only by the few shade (and clay soil) loving plants available, but also by the simple fact that we rent, and some of the scrubby ugly bushes we inherited we will just have to work around. If this were our own house, I'd rip all those hideous shrubs out of there and replace them with some nice ground cover, add in taller plants in the back, perhaps plant a small dwarf-type tree (one that reaches about 6 feet or so fully grown), and the go nuts with hostas and the other purple-leaved plants you'll see below. But since I can't rip it all out and start over, there's a healthy dose of "Just deal with it" here. Tis a tough pill to swallow, though.

Anyway. I'm happy with the progress, but not ready to call it done yet. Below are some pics of where things started this spring (the two hostas I put down last year are back but still filling in and opening up). And the sad wispy green leaves you see in the "before" of the end garden shot is a failed tulip bulb. Poor thing just doesn't get enough light to do anything more than sprout leaves and then feebly flop over.

Here you go:

This year's new additions:

 

Full garden view, before:

Full garden view, as it is now:

Section one, before:

Section one, at present:

Section two, before:

Section two, at present:

End garden, before (see that sad little green clump?):

 End garden, at present (this is my favorite transformation, as it's the most changed):

 And finally, this little guy is the centerpiece on our dining room table!

More to come, but I hope you can appreciate the difference. Look how nice the soil looks in the "afters." I tilled it all up before I put down the new plantings. Ahhh.