I would say the super compacted clay ( earthquake building rules ) is your biggest challenge. These engineered soils have NO drainage. Good results have been seen with raised beds. Buy good Sandy loam not what they sell as topsoil.

I agree, I have started with worm castings, bags and bags and bags of it. I am unsure if I should til the soil though in the new beds because I don't want 8 billion bermuda sprouts to come up. I am hoping because we removed it within a year of it being installed it won't have burrowed too deeply but I have heard horror stories. I was unable to remove any sod from the hill when I rented a sod cutter, it was too steep and the machine would have fallen over. If I lasagna bed it I don't think it will kill the bermuda and I worry about the mulch washing right down the hill. We have two giant drain grates on either side of the yard, the builder told me it was that or a great big ravine in my yard. I went with the grates.

Welcome to coming out of the shadows and joining the crazies here, Lyla! Yep, roses can become a huge obsession once you get started. LOL All I can say is... add lots of amendments to that clay soil, and go get POSEIDON and NEPTUNE! If you like the lavender roses, both of those are good ones!

Oh crap, just read you last post... Bermudagrass is HORRIBLE! Get that crap eradicated before you plant anything else! I accidentally brought one small piece of it in the potted roses when we moved to our current home 16+yrs ago. Once it took hold, I couldn't stop it. It is all over one whole section of my garden. I can't get it all out. My husband says we should dig everything out and kill it off and replant later. But I'm getting too old to do the stuff I'm doing now. Can't even think about doing that. Good luck with that!!

Wow! Your gardens are just beautiful. It's so easy to get obsessed with these babies and we're all in the same boat. You've done a great job and it all looks beautiful. Welcome to crazy town!!! Judy

I'm also a fan of lavender roses. I look forward to seeing your progress.

Lyla , I love your previous gardens , you have quite an eye for design for that being your first garden ! Seriously so beautiful! Your new yard looks ready to go for some great landscaping. I too love limelight hydrangea ( and the others but this is my fav). They are just so easy and gorgeous! Good luck and can't wait to see what you do with it !

Hi Lyla, Welcome to the Charlotte area! I live in York. I moved here 11 years ago, down from New Hampshire where we had nice loam and not a speck of clay in sight. I have to say digging a rose hole can be time consuming but I dig 2 1/2 foot by 2 1/2 foot holes, then when I return the soil I combine 1/3 clay, 1/3 good topsoil, and 1/3 peat moss. Add a bit of bone meal combine it well in my wheelbarrow in batches and dump it back in. While working in clay soil can be time consuming and back breaking, the benefits are still there, as my roses love the clay soil as long as I amend the hole enough. Each year i top dress with aged cow manure and mulch.

My only warning to you about raised beds is our heat in the summer can get quite brutal at times and you will need to make sure it keeps well watered.

Roses do need alot of room for their roots to wander, I would be concerned it your raised bed was as shallow as those in your photo, as the clay soil underneath would not have been amended and your roots won't be able to go down far. I would consider tilling the soil and amending the bed some first.

Lastly, choose your roses wisely for this area if you don't like to spray, as blackspot is a big problem in our area. You may want to look at those more resistant to blackspot. I have some roses that some on this board praise as disease resistant and I still get blackspot on them without spraying. --- Marcia

I loved reading your story Lyla and the people on this forum are the greatest! That Love Song picture is exquisite.

Lavender rose fan here too so I know it's going to be fun to hear about your new venture!

Welcome Lyla! Your first garden was so pretty! I see potential for some unique landscaping at the new place. Lots of possibilities! Good luck and keep us posted on your ideas and progress. I've never had a flat yard and always used slopes/hills to create some really neat landscaping.

Thank you all for the warm welcome =)

bethnorcal9 - I wish I could. It is the only thing our HOA allows. Fortunately, I am on the board of directors now. Unfortunately, I really have no say until the developer is done building homes in the neighborhood and turns complete management over to the residents.

mzstitch- Thank you! I actually grew up here, we moved to Charlotte when I was 8, I stayed until I was 24, and then moved to the West Coast until 2012 when we came back. That is a good idea, digging the holes much bigger and amending the soil further out than the roots will go, eventually the whole bed will be amended then I suppose.

The raised beds were built on top of what had been a playground covered in bark mulch years prior, it was actually a gold mine of healthy soil, so I left the underneath of the raised beds open to the soil below. I also added mulch to the beds to keep the soil moist. I WISH I had the soil here I did there, it was lovely!

I have no issues with shovel pruning roses. It's how I roll. If a rose does well, lovely. It has earned its keep. If it does not, it goes to make room for something new to try.

The hardest thing for me is restraint. I want 800 roses(not really but I can dream...), but I also want lots of evergreens for winter interest. And tons of trees. And hydrangeas, and peonies, and bearded iris, and a billion other things I do not have the space for.

My previous yard was too much for me to keep up with. Mostly because the neighbors had a jungle that threatened to invade and overwhelm my yard constantly. I spent so much time trying to rid myself of vines from two sides I would have nightmares that I had forgotten to trim it for a week and it swallowed my yard. My current yard feels too small and the neighbors too close, but at least they keep their yard clean.

I hear you about HOAs. My first home was new construction. Built a big beautiful pergola into the front gate entrance. Neighbors came to see it and loved it. The development threatened me to take it down. I ignored them. They gave up when many of our neighbors built pergolas too hahaha! HOAs have some benefits, but some rules are just plain dumb (like nothing protruding higher than a 6ft fence line) . Nice that your on the board, maybe you can have some influence. Who knows?!

And yes, when you have limited garden space there's no room for loser plants. I've SP'd many and never thought twice about it.

Glad you came out of lurking! Your first garden was gorgeous! And I'm sure you will overcome the Bermuda and other obstacles to create another masterpiece! I love lanvender roses too and LS is just beautiful. Mine is 2 years old and I'm really hoping she out does herself this year. Thanks for sharing your pics and dreams :)

Thanks for posting and welcome to GW, there same fantastic peeps here,your previous garden was gorgeous you do have a good eye for Gardening..loved the lawn too it glowed wow. your new garden is huge compared to mine but I don't let that stop me I can always fid more room for one more rose...I have very bad clay soil as well , I had a raised bed built it has help. Oh please do get Poseidon and Neptune both are very good roses, Neptune has more fragrance though and poseidon is blooming fool.

Lyla, welcome. I loved your story, and am so impressed with what you achieved in little over a year! in your last garden. I'm sure you'll overcome the obstacles and create another beautiful garden where you are now, and I look forward to photos. Trish

Welcome, Lyla! You obviously know what you're doing design wise. As for planting in clay, well, I know about that! I dig holes at least 2'x2', larger if I can manage it. My soil is also rocky, and I have to use a pick axe. I pull huge river rocks out of the hole. It takes 2 of us to leverage them up and out of a deep hole. Dig as big a hole as you can, because with hard packed clay, your roses will essentially be growing in an earthen 'pot'. Then mulch, mulch, mulch to feed the soil and keep it moist. As for the slope, terracing would take care of the run-off problem. Your previous garden is symmetrical in design, but here you could try curved terraces, following the shape of the slope.

I am quite happy to be here =). The progress on the new garden will be slow as my husband has no interest in spending money on the yard so everything is manual labor on my part whilst trying to sneak in bigger spends. I REALLY want to buy the sod cutter from Northland for around $300 as I think using a manual cutter will help in the taming of the slope but I just know I will get squawked at. And then he might put his foot down about further purchases, and with Spring having not even officially hit yet I think I might just die if I cannot make at least a weekly trip to the garden centers to go treasure hunting.

He also squawks about not having enough grass space. Does he ever even go outside? Nope. But a few years back one of our neighbors made the comment he loves a wide open yard to play ball in and, despite having zero interest in playing ball, Dear Husband thinks that that is what everyone wants and should want. Tons of grass. Fortunately he loves me to bits and I him so I plan to leave some grass....on the front and sides of the house.

It begins, albeit slowly, as I order more and more bags of worm castings to top dress then cover with mulch, the beds are roughly 20 feet long by 8 feet deep and the raised circle is six feet in diameter:

The dreaded back slope, which wouldn't be so dreaded if I could get rid of the sod so I could plant masses of crapes and hydrangeas. The tree is an experiment, at our former home we had a weeping willow in the far left corner about 100 feet from the house. Knowing their propensity for getting into water pipes I didn't want to risk planting it in the ground so close to the house but I love them so much I had to see if a giant 36" pot would work. If it doesn't I will most likely put a coral bark japanese maple there:

Well this just made my day, I was casually browsing my email before hopping into the shower just now:

Hi there!

You are a winner in our Shrub Madness competition! We won’t know what plants you’ve won until round 2 voting is over, but you’ll be receiving the winner of the matchups between Double Play Pink spirea and Tuff Stuff hydrangea and the winner of the matchup between Lemony Lace elderberry and Let’s Dance Big Easy hydrangea. You can also pick one additional variety of your choice as a bonus: https://www.provenwinners.com/plants/search/shrubs.

Please reply with your address – if any of these varieties are not suitable for your climate, we’ll be glad to help you pick a substitute.

Thank you for playing Shrub Madness!

Stacey

Stacey Hirvela

Proven Winners ColorChoice Shrubs

Please let it be hydrangea please let it be hydrangea please let it be hydrangea!!!!

Lyla, I love what you did with the stone blocks around the pot! Were you able to just stack them like that since they are low or did they require a professional and mortar, etc.?

Congrats on your wins! Hope it is a hydrangea too! Will keep my fingers crossed. Your yards are beautiful. Can't wait to see what you do with the new one. It looks like it will be spectacular.

Lavenderlace I did it myself. It's actually hiding some leftover sod I needed to get rid of, so I piled it up, coveredit in triple layers of landscapers plastic, and then circled it with the blocks and added raised bed soil and compost. I did make sure to level them but I did not cement them together as I think I will be moving it back a little further.

It's a super idea and hope I have as good luck as you did, thanks!

Lyla , you are off to a great start and we could be great friends in real life if we lived close ! I too have a husband who just dosnt quite get it . I don't get much squaking but I have learned to spread my purchases out and when I go to lowes "for light bulbs " I buy those and a plant or two as well ;)

just yesteday my sams club trip included a couple boxes of columbine and butterfly weed that won't show up on the credit statement as a plant trip ! Haha

you know what I like about my sweet husband not enjoying gardening , is that the design and plants I choose are up to me . I think it's a perk but I do hope someday we can enjoy gardening together!

Great job on your plant win ! How exciting!! cant get mad about a free plant ! :)

My husband doesn't garden either, I recently tried to talk him into it but he refused. I realized afterwards how lucky I was he said no...I am far too much of a control freak to give any ground (pardon the pun) on my plans for the garden. I have been known to routinely get cash back at the grocery store and suddenly there's more plants in the yard...

Ha lyla that's a good way to do it! It really is a blessing in disguise. My husband did have a koi pond in pa and with it maples and grasses and while I enjoyed it, it was not my style at all. If he builds one again it will be obvious who's gardens are whose . My favorite thing to do is match his golf round cost when he goes. It's only fair , right? ;)

If you like the lavender/purples, here are a few more for your consideration. Twice in a Blue Moon, HT; Lady X, HT; Ebb Tide, FL; Silverado, HT; Blueberry Hill, FL; Reine des Violettes, HP; Cardinal de Richelieu, G; and Charles Rennie Mackintosh, S. You might want to check some of these out to see how they do in your area. Good luck with your project and whatever you decide to put in there.

This person also has a sloped yard

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1623156/dont-knock-the-knockout?n=36

Love that stacked wall, thanks Modest!

http://forums2.gardenweb.com/discussions/1661811/views-from-the-driveway-gardens-were-there-was-once-grass?n=18

This person created raised planters on their slope

More great ideas, thanks again!

What a gasp-worthy garden you made yourself in Charlotte - I am so glad I clicked on this thread, and I'm not ashamed to say that I will probably be stealing an idea or two from you when I get my own garden (I live in a flat at the moment and my rose collection is currently occupying my parents' backyard).

Oh, and your Love Song looked so pretty and happy - did you take her with you?

Lauriescreams - Thank you! I felt like I was just getting into my groove with my last garden when the decision was made to move. We did not take anything with us, our house closed a month before our new house was done being built and we stayed in a hotel for half of that with everything in storage.

I am slowly getting a feel for what the plan will be with this one, my first inclination was to remove the sod on the back slope and plant on it but now I am leaning more towards trying to convince the husband that we need to terrace it with a retaining wall. I have had a few different companies out here to measure and give me quotes but so far none of the quotes have come in yet.

So far the plan for the roses is to plant them in sort of an ombre' effect pattern, with the deepest colors(Young Lycidas, Darcy Brussel) in the middle going out to the lavenders(Plum Perfect, Angel Face, Heirloom, Love Song) and whites(Earth Angel, PJPII, Winchester Cathedral).

I love that plan of the ombre effect Lyla, very creative thinking!