Gold Medal Winner

15 years ago

I'm so proud of my little sister. Last night was the awards for "Edmonds in Bloom". She won a gold medal for her garden! Edmonds is between Seattle and Everett Washington. She and I have been working, changing, her garden for years now. First I made her get rid of ALL grass. It was full of moss and took up valuable space. That was years ago. The garden has evolved since then. Her passion for hostas has grown as mine has. We obcess together. This year I was down visiting and helping her in February and March. Hostas grow like weeds down there. Everything is always getting overgrown and having to be moved around. We moved many, many plants. She has a wonderful raised planter area built a few years ago and now needs more like that. In the meantime we removed roses that seemed to only produce black spot. That's the area you'll see in the front, towards the street with the little brick edging. We were limited by our physical strength (being 2 old ladies) so lots of monster plants went into barrels or the largest size planters. The newer plants ordered this year are in the "blue" area. This triagular garden is what I think will need to be made into a raised garden next year. Leading Lady (the man eater) may take up the whole thing. Here are some pictures of before and after. The latest ones I have are from June.

In the next pictures you can see the two level brick planter. She needs more of these. The blue pots, new plants, are on the left. This is where I think she's going to have to put Leading Lady next year.

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This is in the backyard. Up in the corner is a memorial garden for beloved pets. This is what started the renovations in the first place. Each barrel has plants in memory of a pet with names that are appropriate. Golden Friendship and Faithful Heart for Copper, a beautiful Golden Retriever. There is Lakeside Black Satin for Bastian a black persian cat. This year she lost Kurt, a parakeet. His garden includes Angel Feathers and Mourning Dove.

And finally, here are the weirdest ones of all - my sister and I - she's in green and I'm in red. This was her doing so I'd say she's as nuts as the rest of us.

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Comments (8)

regattagirl
15 years ago
Absolutely wonderful!

WOWWWWWWWW!

You and your sister are talented. It's genetic! Now if we could only figure out what "it" is.

Wonderful. Tell her "Congratulations" from another weirdo.
Janice
15 years ago
Wonderful, wonderful--love the progressive pics.--the hard work sure paid off!!!

She needs to get on here with you and the rest of us 'weirdo's'! Tell her, she'd fit right in!!!

Thank you again--for your pics. and journaling, McT!!!
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esther_opal
15 years ago
We obcess together.

I had an obcess one time, I used hot compresses until it softened then just squeezed it hard.

Really great job and I appreciate the photo journey through the process.
just1morehosta
15 years ago
O MY GOODNESS!!!!!!!!!!

That is truely amazing,how many years have you two been working on this garden?Just from a few months of hard work you have created a lovely,lovely garden,isn't it amazing how quickly things grow?Thank you for sharing these pictures,and please, tell your sister;"Well Done",A gold medel?Sweeeeeet.

You and your sister look alike,execpt you seem to have a fuller head of green, but i can see,hers is just starting,does this kind of thing run in the family? tee hee hee

Carol
hostahaveum
15 years ago
Beautiful Gardens ! Tell her we said congratulations!! I do understand the old lady part , many a day I wished I had done all the heavy yard work when I was younger. I crack my self up when I stick a shovel into the ground ,stand on it, jump on it & it don't even go down 2-3 inches....so being the old weakling I am I just get the hand shovel & take 20 scoops :0 Great you both still have the health & common interest to enjoy your hostas & can travel to each others homes to help each other out. How lucky you are :)
mctavish6
Original Author
15 years ago
Hostahaveum - you're right, I am truly blessed to have a sister that is also my best friend. I'm about to vist her for a long weekend at the begining of the month. We are about 6-7 drive apart which is too long but at least possible.

Carol, I'm not sure how many years we've been working on her yard. I think it started 8-10 years ago after they lost the dog Copper. We did the backyard that year. The year after that we did the front yard - eliminating the grass, creating planting beds, building the fieldstone patio you see in some of the pictures. Back then we were able to go to the quarie, get the stones, place them all on the gravel bed. I remember her starting in the center and singing 'follow the yellow brick road' as she did it. I'm not sure if either of us could do quite as much now. There's a big difference between 50 and 60 I'm finding. In the last few years it's been a matter of trying to find places for all these wildly growing hostas. Her husband built the two raised brick planters (plus a couple in the back yard). Every step is an improvement but there is always more to do. This spring was the first time I'd been down there for 5 years. It was because of my old falling apart car, lack of a passport etc. We did get lots of work done because I stayed 6 weeks.

Janice you're right. She would fit right in. See my comment about our conversation last night on the 'now I know' thread.
upnort
15 years ago
LOVE LOVE LOVE THE PICS! My body aches just looking at all the work you both put into this. How nice to have someone to bond with. Congrats both of you!
jel48
15 years ago
Absolutely beautiful, McT. Tell your sis congratulations and congratulations to you too because you had a big part in this as well! The photos are great. I loved looking through them!

Gold Medal Winner

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regattagirl

Janice

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