Bird house???

What is it with me and critters? How come they want to set up housekeeping where they don't belong? We got the cats in the woodpile (which we're still in the process of catching) and a bird who never quite succeeded in nesting in the porch light, leaving a major mess of nesting material all over the porch. Now we have another bird trying to disrupt my natural order of things. Sheesh!

I have this gorgeous hanging plant that is performing beautifully on the deck. See?

So this AM as I go about my morning routine, I look out the window and, hello! a big ol' robin pops up out of my hanging plant!! Lovely... now I'm going to end up with some gnarly ol' mass of bird poop, feathers, and broken stems! Aaarrggghh!

Hello?? That's what allll the trees in the yard are for, you simple creature! Pick one!

Tilling the soil...

Today was the day for making a new bed...
in ground that's never been cultivated before...

The Man dug up all the grass... a major task in itself...

Then tilled the rock hard ground...

After a day of hard labor, the
bed is ready to receive its plants...

Planted in soil now rich in top soil,
soil conditioner, and compost...

... then mulched and watered, we have happy little
euonymous bushes in their new home.

The Man has earned a well-deserved rest!!

Yard work...

Mother's Day is coming and around here, that means planting time. By then, it's usually safe enough, weather-wise. This year might be an aberration though - I'm freezing my tush off and had to turn the heat on again this morning. We also got hit with the remnants of that wicked wind from the west last night and the yard is littered with new leaves and cherry blossoms - screwy weather!

We're getting ready anyway though. We've been to the nursery twice so far and have these goodies in the garage, waiting to hit the dirt:

1 replacement azalea
4 euonymous shrubs
1 marguerite daisy
1 black-eyed susan
1 forget-me-not
3 shade coleus
1 dwarf bleeding heart
1 hosta
5 New Guinea impatiens
1 verbena hanging basket

(there are photos on my Project 365 blog if you care.)

Gonna mean a bit of labor for my #1 digger - aka Lew. We've decided to finally put the shrubs in alongside the garage, which means a whole new bed - we'll have to rent a rototiller for that. The azalea space needs to be re-dug and the mailbox garden I'm planning will need some digging. Even the hanging basket needs a hook to hang on! (Everything got taken down last year when we installed new siding.) As I type, he's outside mulching the backyard azalea bed. It's a good thing he likes to putter in the yard too!

We still have to pick up more annuals for the existing beds and will probably make another trip to the nursery later today. I really love this time of year!

Quirks of nature...

Check out the neat surprise we discovered this evening...

... we have a white dogwood growing in among our lilacs. The surprise part is that we never planted a white dogwood! Isn't nature cool?? I talked about it a bit on my Project 365 photo blog too.