First Post

So Jacqueline and I started our third spring together. Our third year of planting, arguing about what should go where, how this and that should work or look, and our third year of dead bushes. So far in three years, we have killed a Gardenia, a Camellia, 2 Azaleas, a bunch of who knows what kinds of annuals, and I don't know what else.

Today we just planted 4 Hino Crimson Azaleas in the front yard by the walk. They have a nice deep green foliage and dark purple to red flowers. There is already a leftover white azalea of some sort next to them - a leftover from a group of three, two of which died when we moved in. We compromised on breaking up the small bed so the white azalea doesn't look out of place. Hopefully it works, otherwise I lose yet another foothold against my designerly superior wife.

We first pulled all the dead grass out of the bed - a bunch of seeds washed down from the yard last year. Then we busted it up with a hoe and one of those four pronged earth churn thingies. After that, we mixed up a batch of 1/3 bed dirt, 1/3 soil conditioner, and 1/3 cow manure. The nice lady at Home Depot recommended this mix, although she said "your clay" in place of our bed dirt. Hopefully its the same thing.

We planted the azaleas with the root balls approximately 1"-2" above the surface. My designer wife said it looked funny and complained, but alas I prevailed. I guess the idea is that the rootball needs to breath, so it needs to be uncovered. I've heard of making a ridged wall around the planting to direct water to the plant - we didn't do that this time.

The ground here gets a little dry at one end, being so close to the house. I guess we'll need to keep an eye on the water.

Other stuff to do this week: mulch the bed, add some smaller perennials and annuals around it, plant several 1 gallon baby azaleas, a 3g camellia, 2 blueberry bushes, and 2 hydrangeas.

Happy gardening!