The Parking Strip Project

You can't seem anything special now, but just wait!

When we bought our house 4 years ago, there was an annoying patch of weed grass growing in our lawn.  And I'm ashamed to say that I ignored it that year.  I was pregnant and we were doing so many other projects that digging out that grass didn't make it to the top of my list.  I dug it out the next year, but I had waited too long. The grass had spread.  Again I employed my non-effective strategy of ignoring the problem.  That was dumb, again.  But, by the next fall, I was pregnant again and then last Spring had a brand new baby.  You might ask why my husband didn't take care of the problem, and the honest answer is that he doesn't enjoy yardwork and it never made it to the top of his list either.  So, the problem grew, and grew, and grew, until we had four more patches in our lawn and a ton of patches in the parking strip.  This year I decided to dig them up.  I also decided to replace the spots in the lawn with good grass from the parking strip.  I knew that once I dug out all of the bad grass and good grass to fix the main lawn, that I would have dug out roughly 40% of my parking strip.

 I am not a fan of parking strips, especially when mowing time approaches.  So, I decided to just keep on digging.  And digging and digging and digging.  My kids dug, my husband dug, some friends dug.  We dug and dug and dug. We found two tree stumps that had been covered by grass.  The little girls managed to unearth the first one. The second one was stuck, with roots growing under the sidewalk.  I left that one alone for a while and kept on digging. 

Finally, after an incredible amount of dirtiness and many weeks of dumping grass in the trash can, the big white container that came for 24 hours, and the neighbors' cans, and waiting for the garbage man to be forced to turn on the "turbo" mode to lift our can, we finished digging. And we got out that big stump.  That thing was huge! Earlier this week I had the intense pleasure of borrowing a tiller and tilling the crud out of that dirt.  It felt so good! Then I was finally able to plant the 12 perrenials my mother had purchased for me about 4 weeks ago.  They had pretty serious roots going on.  I transplanted a bunch of perrenials starts from my yard and slapped in some annuals for fun and then found a neighbor to help us get some wood chips, which turned into mulch by the time the men got back from the dump. But, for $20, I'm not complaining. The dirt was very unnatractive and is now hidden under 3-5 inches of mulch.  Me likey!

Now, it's not really very pretty right now, but it's going to be.  Just wait and see! I have some really awesome bulbs on order that will come in the fall and by next Spring, my new garden should be a thing of beauty, full of pink and white daffodils, parrot tulips, rembrandt tulips, every kind of purple tulip you can imagine, purple crocuses, and valentine's day colors of hyacinth.  When that show ends, I'm planning a tribute to my alma mater, BYU, with blue and white allium.  Then the perrenials will take over and delight me with a rainbow of colors until the fall when the purple blooming fall crocuses say hello before the viscious snow comes.  I can't wait!

Total cost so far-
$20 for soil and compost
$20 for mulch
$6 for annuals
lilies, lamb's ear, lavender, and other perrenial starts transplanted from my yard- FREE
From My Mom
$15 for 12 small perrenials from Marvin's Gardens
$80 ish for amazing bulbs from the internet

From my contact rebate credit card
$63 from the Michigan bulb company for bulbs and perrenials.  I can't wait to see what the Clara Curtis Daisy looks like!

Total cost to me- $46
Total cost overall- $204

It's going to be so pretty next year!