A Spring Update

I had great visions of building out all of my new beds over the winter - getting them ready for my Spring plants. What was I thinking? Tulsa usually has enough warmish weather during our winters to allow for such planning. Not this year. Either my thermostat has severely changed or it really was too cold to be working outside.

None the less, I thought I'd offer ya'll a peak at what I've been doing over the past two weeks. This is just part of it. I'll post more on Monday.

My plants arrived from Spring Hill two weeks early. Being on the northern cusp of my zone, I know my weather. Even though it felt like Spring, mother nature had one last hurrah up her sleeve.

Undaunted - and desperate to put my new babies in the ground, lest they die on my front porch, I set out to build the four garden beds that I was supposed to build out over the winter.





One of my new beds. This new bed is located directly over the spot where our Bradford Pear resided prior to the ice storm of 2007. I let that part of my yard rest for a full season before building out anything new.

Going through my gardening journal, I noticed that I have nothing yellow. This bed fixes that. My Golden Chain Tree arrived while I was in Nashville two weeks ago, and she really needed a place to belong. The bed was not ready when she arrived. Oklahoma does not have black dirt. I'm learning as well that I can not simply dig a hole and plant a bush. I have to "build" my beds. This bed is built up with cotton burr compost, top soil, and sandy loam for drainage.

A thoughtful note here: While black dirt smells wonderful back home in NY, clean and crisp. Created black dirt made with compost - does not.

These two shots are part of my new "wall." Built out on either side of our old swingset, I have three hedge roses - promised to grow five feet tall.



At the far of of this shot you can see the boxes that I am trying to hide her. Also planted at the end of these roses is a Freedom Rose - that grows about 10 feet tall. I thought that would make a good focal point for the end of the row.

The picture below is my Blue Wisteria vine. I am planning on training her up the swing set. Next year we will turn the set into a pegoda - by extending it either forward or backwards depending on where the city will let us dig. For now, I'll leave it alone and see what the wisteria does.



I was right about Mother Nature - today's low is in the low 30's and they are predicting ice rain mixed with snow. I mulched my beds and I'm hoping for the best.

More to come...