Walk Before I Run

Like many gardeners out there, I have received some seed catalogues in the mail. Flipping through the pages and admiring the bright colours has my head spinning. Just a picture of a juicy red tomato makes my mouth water!

As I've read here and here, it is wise to live somewhere and observe for a year before going too overboard landscaping. So while I enjoy imagining what some of the beautiful perrenials would look like in our yard, I have to proceed slowly this year and get the structure right.

I've been reading Toby Heminway's Gaia's Garden, along with various other gardening books:

• The Year Round Vegetable Gardener by Niki Jabbour
• New City Gardener by Judith Adam with Tim Saunders
• Landscaping With Stone by Tom Wilhite and Editors of Sunset
• The Back to Basics Handbook by Abigail R. Gehring, editor

I've got some great plans that need installed long before I get to the pretty part: flowers and vegetables. I am itching to get my yard started, but there is alot of planning, measuring and building to be done before I spend much money plants. I think this year we will concentrate on trees, building raised beds and doing our stone walkways and borders. I want to get some perrenials in place, and allow them to get a good start and next year will be a year of filling spaces and picking out the pretty parts.

While we are staying at my parents' I plan to ready some containers that can be moved over when the house arrives. Nothing like a little instant garden! If all goes well I will have alot done when the house gets there, so that it looks less like a sore thumb. A friend has also offered to throw a "perrenial" house warming where all guests bring a plant they have divided in their own yard. What a great way to build some memories!