We haven’t touched our front garden in four months and you can tell.
After our hard work last summer, this mound of weeds is a terrifying sight.
The winter rains have helped the weeds take over the yard. We never pruned back our perennials (plants that will grow back again this spring). We never yanked those bare cosmos plants, annuals dead because of frost and in dire need of being removed. The yard was a mess:
We’ve had a string of gorgeous (gorgeous!) summer-like days, so my daughter and I spent two hours starting to whip that front yard into shape. We’re all about telling that clover who’s boss.
(Especially when it’s 75 degrees out and super sunny; we HAD to be outside.)
After our mama-daughter clean-up party, the yard looks a little bit better:
We still have lots to do. Here’s our list of garden tidying tasks for the month:
1. Take down and dissemble holiday wreaths.
2. Remove rotting pumpkins from porch and place into compost bins.
3. Tiddy up kids toys so we don’t come close to breaking our necks every time we enter the house.
4. Find a pillow and sew a cover for the porch chair. This one has been on my to-do list for two years. We’ll see if we get to it this year.
5. Finish weeding. Cause we have three feet tall giant purple allium bulbs set to arrive in this exact spot soon. Like next week.
6. We also need to lay down a layer of compost and mulch to prepare for the long, dry summer ahead.
We have a little bit of time for the last task because even if it feels like summer with these atypical hot and dry days, it’s really just February, right?! Oh, wait, it’s February in Northern California and our last frost date is a month and a half away!
My to-do list just got longer.
It appears I need to get our veggie beds ready too. Time to start those cool-season crops on our windowsill because spring is just around the corner.
I’m so excited! Stay tuned!