What did you do yesterday?

Wow, that looks awesome, you did such a good job! I think the flower bed space that you left will look great too. It's so nice to look at a lawn that isn't half yellow and white with dandelions, like mine : ) Do you have to keep the sod watered pretty often until it takes root?

LOL, looks like you got plenty of work out of that tiller, wish I had gotten the bigger one : )

Wow Michele!! When you comin' over to MY yard!!! You are one workhorse!!!

I just found time to look at this thread. I heard about it on chat the other night.
Great work Chele.
On the Troy Built tillers. I've had mine for 20 years. The trick to making them work is not to go to deep all at once. Start out shallow & drop a couple of notches at a time. You will really love it once you get used to it.
Bernie

You know, I had those four pallets of sod sitting out there and I kept looking at them thinking I had way too much. I was trying to think of all these other places to put it. LOL My neighbors kept going by and looking like they were trying to figure out where I would put it all. hahaha At this point, I think my neighbors just watch and wonder. I don't think anything I do really surprises them. Other than my friend that helped with the first pallet, the kids did a few pieces and not a single soul even offered a hand. Now I have had about 5 different people on the street ask me to do theirs (joking, I hope!). I hope a bunch of them don't decide to try it. They hire people to mow their lawns and are worn out after doing a flat of annuals! ROTF

Thank you all for your compliments. It was hard work but it is so nice to look out there and see all that green. You have never seen kids go so crazy over some grass. LOL

Bernie, I think I will get the hang of it eventually OR I will knock my teeth out. LOL When it does not dig in, that sucker can sure take off. LOL I know why they decided to call it a bronco too! :)

Wow! Michele you inspire me!!! Your yard is looking awesome. Love it! Rain or no, I'm working outside today!

'Chele, wonderful job!

I put down 2 pallets of sod with a helper 2 years ago for a client, like to killed me. But then I've got a few years on you. I think my grass days are over, even mowing my own LOL.

I'm happy to come to work today... to take a little bod break.
Yesterday I dug 20 boxwoods, moved 4 around back 'removed' sod in two new strips for the other 16. What were 4'x40' and 2'x30' paths around the center bed were scapled and covered with 2" of finely shredded bark last year. It was a new subdivision when I built here so I had backfill with 2-4" of topsoil...if lucky. The mulch was now packed and breaking down as well.

I ordered a new tool last fall after reading about it in Mother Earth News. It's called a 'Deep Spader' is very heavy being all steel and it was expensive BUT I wish I had known about this years ago when opening new beds in this backfill. Stand up and wiggle those 16" tines (1/2" thick blades really) down to the hilt then heave back. It cuts and eventually lifts and flips chunks about 20" wide and as deep as you went. I then went through with my tiller with the stake at it's deepest. 12" I think Sod and composted mulch were already on the bottom and I threw a barrow of compost on the new boxwood strips. Almost like tilling the vegetable garden.

Using the deep spader before tilling makes opening a new bed or preparing for sod/seed so much easier.

This message was edited Apr 18, 2005 10:10 AM

Sounds like a profitable workout, 8ftbed...

I got all my EE's planted outside, planted tomatoes, green peppers, and got my Red Castor Beans planted, can't wait for them to come up this is the first time I have had Red Castor Beans. Going to town today and buy some 50lb bags of potting soil to get ready to plant my Brugs outside. Don't want to move them to the outside until around the first of May, but I need to start getting things ready to start my planting.

If that's the Carmencita castors, you're gonna love them if you like big and tropical. Well, like tomatoes and brugs the more you feed and water the bigger they get. I just started my tomatoe seeds on 4/14. April has been above normal temps most of the month it wouldn't surprise me if May is cold and wet with a final frost on 31-May like it did 2 years ago.

I added this yesterday. I dragged around 2400 pounds of topsoil along with a bale of peat and 200 pounds of composted manure. My eldest went beind me and planted the hems from the Texasgarden co-op.

I went ahead and expanded the bed outside the fence to make room for more daylilies. LOL Nice blurry pic. I think my arms must have been shaking by this point. :)

As you can see, remaining clean is VERY important. LOL I think my 11 year old must have done that!

Good grief is that the same yard?? Oh and you don't look dirty at all!! LOL!!!!

LOL I have not even gotten on the scale to see if I lost weight. You would think I had but usually I don't. LOL Now I am working on the playground and swimming pool sites. :)

If you keep that pace up you won't have to step on a scale to tell woman!! You are making me tired just looking at your pictures!!!

LOL I figure all of it is getting us closer to being able to move next year. :)

Holy cow, 2400 lbs of topsoil and that's as dirty as you got?? You did good girl! That looks so great, it's amazing what a difference a good landscaping job can make! Wanna come to KY.... ;-)

Michele I would like for you to know that you inspired me to mow the lawn and spread out weed and feed. LOL! Ok, I'm getting "warmed up" and eyeing that rototiller in our shed!

Michele, you amaze me! Everything looks wonderful. And I am also tired just thinking about all the work you are doing.

Chele it all looks great. I don't guess it I will get the honor of watering it according to the forcast for the weekend.

Thanks a bunch! It is nice seeing it all finally get straightened out and cleaned up and pulled together. It is amazing what you can do when you have a bit of time and money.

Looks like mother nature will be doing the watering. :)

Egads woman!

Well I must still be alive because I was out digging up, moving and levelling cinder block earlier. I also planted 6 ferns, about a dozen hosta and loaded up some more cell trays for transplanting. LOL

Stop it Michele!! You are making the rest of us look REALLY bad!!!

Wow, I am apparently bothering you so bad you are starting to repeat yourself. ROTFLOL

I left out the part where I also shreded a bunch of honeysuckle yesterday too. :)

HAHAHAHA! How did I DO that?? Oh well. That was pre coffee of course!!

Hey, I read somewhere that honeysuckle leaves are full of calcium (or something). Cook em up and let us know! LOL!!

My luck they are a natural laxative or something and I'd spend the next week in the bathroom and miss the RU. LOL

Wow Michele! You did a wonderful job and your backyard look nicely. Your children can have yard to play.. Hope mother nature brings you some rain.

We are gonna have big dump truck to bring us 6 loads of dirts to fill around house. Right now, it's unlevel! I tired of walking ups and downs to get in/out of the house! LOL Our pastures are flat but some are hills by mother natures.

Hi, badseed--

just found this thread and all the bobcat talk and pics of your sod work. Very impressive! (Would love to know where you rented the Bobcat.)

And would love to know how your sod and hemerocallis are doing now--(are you having to water a lot?)

Will you have the daylilies ready for the big hem. convention coming up in July? Think you should sign up to be a tour garden....Everyone would want to hear the story and see the pics of your 'before and after' Much more interesting than just a bunch of pretty day lilies like the other gardens! :-)

hope things are going well for you and the fam...and they are enjoying the new play yard.

take care. j.

Hey Judy!

The sod is actually doing really well. I have a few spots that look a little dead but I guess it is to be expected with the wacky weather! I put it in when it was in the 70s then we had that week of 30-50 with rain. I think the grass was confused after being ripped from it's happy home then heated then frozen. LOL I over seeded for good measure.

After checking about every rental place within 20 minutes of here, I went with EZ Rental up in Withamsville-just on the other side of 275 behind the old Furrows.

The hems are settling in. I have another dozen or so to plant but I am doing some rearranging. I have always kept hot colors in back and cool colors in front and I have decided to throw caution to the wind and mix my colors! LOL I am putting some purples in the back and moving some oranges and yellows out front. I have some hems with buds but it will be another month before the yard is busting with blooms. I think I need more earlies. :)

My garden is nowhere up to the AHS standards I am sure. I do work hard and have gotten a ton of things done, but there is so much to do still! It seems money and time never collide. When there is one, there is rarely the other. I am just enjoying having so much done, while I still plug away, seeing what is still not done. Somehow I think the tourists would not be impressed by my gardens with a thousand dollars worth of toys and cheap swimming pools thrown in. LOL I do appreciate the compliment though.