The State of My Garden

In a word...scary.  Seriously.  Take a look.  Would you want to walk in here?

I certainly haven't wanted to in quite some time and it shows.  I'm afraid of what I might scare up.  I startled a little bunny rabbit last week and I also saw a beautiful Western garner snake.  But I'm not sure what other sinister critters may be hiding out in this mess.  I only have one garden bed that is still growing stuff and that's my sweet potato bed.  And I peeked in there a couple of days ago and oh my goodness, will I have sweet potatoes!  But that's for another post :)

The current state of my garden is also very embarrassing for me.  I have Never.Ever. let my garden get so overgrown and messy.  I still can't believe it looks so bad.  But this summer, it has just been too darn hot to get out there and work it.  And it still is.  It was 99 degrees yesterday...and it's the end of September for crying out loud!

Anyway, I have been procrastinating long enough.  It's time I did something to clean up this mess and get my garden back!  And I've also done something else I've never done before concerning my garden.  I actually hired a crew to clean it out.

It pains me to admit this.  I've always taken great pride in my garden, in how productive and beautiful it is (usually), and in doing all the work myself.  But I finally admitted to myself that I needed help.  And look what they've done!

They cleaned out all the beds

mowed all the weeds down to the ground,  laid a weed mat around the entire garden floor and put down a 6-inch layer of mulch, turned over all the soil in all the beds and spread a bag and half of compost I had laying around.  I was out there yesterday morning before they finished the job and couldn't believe how much better it looked already!

Of course the puppies were very curious as to what this was all about...not to mention all these great new smells!  It was also a treat for them because my garden is usually off limits.

And see what it looks like now!  I have my beautiful garden queendom back! 

Many thanks to Mark and his crew for all their hard work!

Harry and I leave in a couple of days for two weeks in Paris and Holland.  When we get back, all I have to do is add some compost to a few beds and plant my fall and winter garden.  Yay!  I'm anxious to get back into my garden.  I've really missed it these past couple of months.  I'm also anxious to get back to blogging.  I've missed that and y'all too!  Of course, I probably lost a lot of you guys too during my lil break :/

Thank you all for your patience and encouraging words in my last two posts.  Hopefully, I will be back online by the middle of October.  Until then, bon voyage! :)