Wednesday, June 26, 2013

Holy Crap It's Hot!!!

You just don't notice it around here since the air is cool coming off the bay, but it is darn hot and sunny again.  The sun angle is so low here that it really gets at you.  I was just out working on the ditch and have been sweating buckets - and I'm not normally a big sweater.

"The Ditch" will be my next project.  A guest was here the other day, and though Maria almost never gets anything but rave reviews online, this particular guest said that "the back view was majestic indeed, but the front view lacked curbside appeal." I began wondering what I could do about that.

Last years Alaska winter was harsh, and it killed many of the elderberry bushes and grass. Big pieces of the lawn are brown and barren - so it's very patchy.  And, the ditch really needs attention.  It's a drainage area that's sort of like a bog in disguise.  Maria says people have accidentally backed into it, and have sunk up to their axel in no time.  Anyway, it's all grown over with the lush green wild vegetation, and underneath is years of dead tall grass and stalky stuff (I don't know the names of the plants around here), and underneath that is some deep muck!  Today, I'm cutting it all back with the weed eater - then raking it all out and hauling it away.  It's a moist environment, so I'm hoping that if we get everything else killed off, and then get the ground roughed up, we can get some wildflowers going.  I'm doing the labor part of it, and Maria is off to the seed store to see what she can find.  I should be taking before and after pictures, but once again, I am too late for that.

That's my vision anyway.  It would be cool if, when people come up the driveway, they are wowed with a lush, green lawn that is neatly trimmed - and wildflowers everywhere.  Mom - there's lots of lupins lining the roadways around here, but Maria says they are hard to get started. Any ideas?

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