gardengal48: ok, that is very helpful. Thank you. :-) nwnatural: given the feedback here, and our assessment of the situation, that is the direction we are going. karinl: I am glad to hear that it didnt come off as whining, which was not my intention. I greatly respect the skills and abilities of the people here who work with gardens and landscaping. It is just a bit overwhelming to the rest of us mortals. In terms of the ground cover, this was suggested to us by a friend who is a true gardener, and we have incorporated various types of thyme, teucrium, cerastium, etc. into our design. The problem is that this site was full of weeds when we cleared it to build the house and we need to control that without the use of chemicals if we can avoid it. Based on how the ground cover does, we may be able to slowly incorporate it in other areas, thereby achieving eco-enlightenment. :-) I have included photos below: gweirdo: it is somewhat difficult to answer your question, since we didnt do the landscape design. I can say that our intention was to use drought-tolerant plants that grow well in this area to create an ambiance that defined a place of sanctuary for us. Since a Mediterranean landscape evoked that feeling for us, we began to use that term, perhaps inappropriately. We also wanted to contribute to the land by replacing all the scruffy weeds with plants that would help support the local wildlife (the birds and the bees, not the adolescents in Mini-Coopers). The difficulty is to being able to communicate the experience we want from our garden using the limited lexicon that we have. It is like trying to tell someone from another planet what milk tastes like. We know exactly what we are talking about (fortunately) but no one else does. This probably means we were raised by wolves. To see the details of our design, please go here: http://forums2.gardenweb.com/forums/load/design/msg0623022121666.html inkognito: I believe I have read enough of your posts to both respect your knowledge and appreciate your writing style. I also believe that you do not mind a bit of verbal jousting, which I am happy to provide. No offense was taken. :-) I will talk to our landscaper about the suggestions you mentioned thank you. We were also concerned about the clean up on gravel, so you are spot on there. springvillegardens: your herb garden is beautiful and the view of the hills is amazing. You have obviously put a great deal of work and love into your creation. Thank you so much for sharing this. frankie_in_zone_7: your vote has been noted and recorded for posterity. I hadnt thought about the linear feet of raking on the paths. Hmmm.... perhaps I need to take up Zen Buddhism. When you say decomposed compacted material, do you mean decomposed gravel and would that be with landscape cloth underneath or not? Thanks.

I typed this response below before I realized that you don't live in California, but Oregon! You can still have a mediterranean inspired garden further north, but will have to adjust your planting choices to reflect that you are still mediterranean influenced in climate, but too cold and often too wet to slavishly emulate a California mediterranean style. It can certainly be done, even so, as there are classic mediterranean style gardens even in Vancouver, BC, or along the East Coast, where maintaining drought tolerant mediterranean plants in east coast summer heat, humidity and rainfall takes extra work. Adapting a plant palette that emphasizes gray foliage, and avoids the lush and green will go a long ways towards establishing the look. If you are set within tall conifer woods or surrounded by lots of big deciduous shade trees, it may be a stretch to pull this off visually. Most classic mediterranean gardens are washed in bright sun, and would typically rely on overhead screens or everegreen trees to create some relief in summer. If you have a situation where you can create a walled courtyard, it might be far easier to create a landscape within to suit your theme, and relate the outside to the surrounding neighborhood if the mediterranean theme/illusion can't be sustained. If you ahve your heart set on a palm as part of the theme, a Mediterranean Fan Palm/Chamaerops humilis or Windmill Palm/Trachycarpus fortunei are two that would take your climate. The following is what I had started to reply before I realized you are so much further north... The remnant gardens of all of the California missions are but fantasy recreations, with little basis in fact. You probably wouldn't want to emulate the real thing, it would be too sparse, utilitarian and devoid of plants. Mission gardens were for work and agriculture, not aesthetics. Michelle has pointed you in a good direction as to books and info. You will probably find that it makes much more sense to design a mediterranean inspired garden full of plantings that reflect your climate. If you stay true to this, you won't include a lawn, or insist on the garden being at its peak in mid summer, when a mediterranean garden would be resting for lack of water, and waiting to revive with the fall rains. (This is probably true even for your location in Oregon, where most gardens still need some supplemental irrigation in summer and early fall, even with your reputation for so much more rain that here in California). Winter and spring growth and bloom, lots of plants that are naturally designed to conserve water in summer and survive would be the majority of the garden. I personally would not recommend a Mexican Fan Palm for the entry; too large and messy, there are many other more suitable palms. I'd consider using rosemary, lavenders, santolinas, phlomis, as backbone perennials in the garden. If you want to take a cue from moorish/spanish themed gardens in particular, then inlucing a few classic courtyard more water loving plants to be used as accents might include an orange or lemon tree and a small fountain within a walled courtyard. Using tile, saltillo pavers or decomposed granite fines as paving/non planted surfaces would also give a classic mediterranean feel. For me, there are several public gardens that exude this feeling. Visit the buildings and surrounding gardens of San Diego's Balboa Park, or State Street in Santa Barbara and especially the County Court House Complex. If you wanted to design a mediterranean inspired garden using California natives, the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden above the mission further up the canyon is another great place to visit and get ideas. Also in nearby Montecito, the Casa del Herrero Garden is open to the public by appointment, and has great spanish detailing to the house and gardens. I would recommend seeing as much as you can, and formulating your own style based on what you like, rather than trying to emulate a formula for your new gardenI'm willing to bet there are plenty of good examples of "mediterranean style" gardens in your own community, especially if you live somewhere like Pasadena or San Diego. Well, as you can see, alot of the references will not apply as you don't live anywhere near Southern California, but taking in the sights and paying a visit might still be good for generating ideas to recreate the "sense" of a classic mediterranean garden. Planting things that can survive and still look good on your seasonal rainfall also makes good sense even if the style isn't medit in feeling. You won't have to work as hard to keep it alive in the next drought, nor spend as much time pruning things back that are encouraged to overgrow by too much regular watering out of the natural rainfall season.

BinsB How GREAT! I'd guess by now the 'kids' are knocking from the outside - yes? Paleese post a pic if you can. We'd all (I'm sure) love to see your accomplishments :-))) after waiting soooo long. Love the orange colors of the nursery but mmm - are they really going to sleep in one crib? :-)) Just kidding. When you have time, which likely won't be for awhile I'm sure, would love to see the nursery with the paper flowers, et al. Not to worry about the non-span house of present. It's the spirit inside that can carry it thru. Imagine what a tough time I have in my location. LOL!! You'll have lotsa fun (when/if you can find the time) doing some special stuff in your new abode. Trop - hmmm pictures this year? LOL! That will be fun to see. I'll look forward (but won't hold my breath too awfully long). :-))) I'm thinking maybe you just eliminated the kitchen altogether and are doing take out now? Houseful it's great to have you posting again. Perhaps you can help us breathe some life back into this thread as I know Bins is going to be rather busy over the next while. :-)) If it weren't for her dedication, I'm sure this thread would no longer exist. I have a few things on my plate but hopefully they will be resolved shortly and I can return to my decorating love. And speaking of thread(s), I didn't check but I'm thinking we must be getting close to limit - yes? Should we be starting a new thread? Waddya all think? Take care all, Holly

We had worked with Carlene Anderson CKD in 2010. She is based in Oakland, CA and is a real dear to work with. She is very patient with us. We didn't even have a picture of any "ideal" kitchens to show her when we first met. That was how clueless we were. We only knew we had an IKEA kitchen budget. Ha, that was so long ago... We ended up not using her final layout design for us as I decided I want to keep the built-in china cabinet, and that triggered a realization that we tend to make decisions slowly. Meaning, hiring a CKD is great if you like to make decisions fast. Sadly, we don't operate that way. We chew (or obsessed?) on various aspects of the kitchen for a long time. And, we don't have the budget to keep going through many layout iterations with a CKD. So, slowly over many moons, we redid the layout ourselves with helpful tips from GW-ers. But, we incorporated many of Carlene's key ideas into our current kitchen remodel to improve the flow and functionality of our kitchen. Other places/people I have talked to that could be a good resource for you: - Custom Spaces on Solano Ave, Berkeley - Paragon Kitchen in Oakland - JB Turner and Sons, in Oakland I didn't use their services since we ended up purchasing Inner Most cabinetry from HD as it fits our budget better. All the best in your search!