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Landscape Design

Simple pleasures....

woodyoak zone 5 southern Ont., Canada

11 years ago

One of the things we most enjoy doing in the garden is lounging on the back porch, overlooking the peaceful green garden in the backyard. The view of the the backyard garden from the house was a very important consideration when planning and planting it. The inside -> outside views are equally, if not more, important than the closer views you get as you walk around the lawn and paths in the backyard. While the backyard garden is not 'finished', we get great pleasure and satisfaction from it almost every day, and particularly on a day like today spent relaxing with congenial companions in a congenial place :-)

(There's no point to this post other than to share the pleasure that our garden provided to us today... I hope your day was as satisfatory as ours.)

The 'nest' on the back porch:

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The view from the lounge chair:

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Comments (4)

adriennemb2
11 years ago
Not something I would ever have dreamt myself saying as a child but...great hostas, woody! I love the overall green of your woodland. But where is the prerequisite cup of tea to accompany your book on the porch?
beeps
11 years ago
Wow. Your dogs are beautiful! Oh, and yes, your yard too! =) I so miss living in the parts of the country where yards like that exist. Sigh...
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woodyoak zone 5 southern Ont., Canada
Original Author
11 years ago
adrienne - no tea for me :-) The patio hosta bed is one of my favorite things. The 'Elegans' hosta is a particular favorite - it is 5-6' wide with enormous leaves. I tried to arrange the hostas as a color progression and play with big and small ones. So the bed starts in the L between the patio and the ramp with the smallish blue 'Halcyon', then the huge blue 'Elegans', then the smallish blue and gold variegated 'June' (although the gold variegated has faded out to a light green over the years...), then it moves back to big again but continues the gold variegation theme with 'Frances Williams', then along the north side it goes back to big blue with a couple of 'Bressingham Blue'. Behind the blue 'Elegans' and 'Halcyon' is the big blue and white 'Northern Halo' and behind 'Francis Williams' and 'June' is the large, bright green 'Piedmont Gold' (which is getting overrun by the big Persicaria polymorpha!) The pots of Golden Forestgrass that goes so well with 'Frances Williams' are usually in the boxes of the planter bench. We didn't bother setting up the bench this year so I just grouped the pots near the hosta. I do like to play with color and I like big, bold plants :-)

beeps - The big Copper beast (a Briard - a breed aptly described as 'a German Shepherd in a clown suit'!) is a house guest for a week while her owners are on vacation. The little beast is ours. Misty takes no guff from her big buddy!
karin_mt
11 years ago
What a beautiful shady garden! Those hostas real treasures, nicely done. I'm glad you took some time to lounge about and appreciate it all instead of compulsively working on it all the time.

The dogs look just as happy as the hostas. A good scene all around. :)

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