G'day Kylie

While my yard had the basic landscaping done when I bought the house, I
did pull lots of stuff out.......eg, LARGE quantities of Dietes which
took over during the second year (back when it used to rain heaps)!! I
keep a clump of these in a pot these days in order to keep them under
control.

What I could see though, was that the landscapers had a basic colour
scheme so I decided to go with this...it also matches the house colours
and is quite a feat at times to find plants in a particular colour,
being burgundy, pink and cream/white. I quite like the challenge of
finding plants in these colours, it's something I haven't done in
previous gardens.

I don't have a 'grand plan' as such and just make changes as I think of
new ideas or see something in a magazine or on TV that I think might
suit, but having said that I did put a lot of thought into a couple of
trees that could be planted, in my now, small back yard. Previous
gardens have been several acres so I used to plant what I liked, found
at a special price or were given by other gardeners whose trees/shrubs
became too large for their space and needed to be moved to a new
location. One of these was a 'very' large cactus collection, with some
being 2 metres tall and with several trunks. An extremely dry area,
where nothing else would grow, was just perfect and they looked right at
home.

Bronwyn ;-)





0tterbot wrote:

it occurred to me the other day that i have no "grand plan" for my garden,
and i should perhaps therefore stop doing new things until i've thought of
one. but having said that, i'm not good at thinking of things which don't
exist yet, so i'm not quite sure what to do!! i don't object to the basic
layout, but then, maybe that's only because i can't think of anything
better!

is your garden all carefully planned? or would you rather just work with
what is already there? is it perhaps easier and better to think up small
changes as you go, in order to develop a bigger picture of how you would
like it to be? my original idea (cough) was to have "garden rooms" & all of
this, but now i can do that, i can't imagine where to begin!

i think though at this point, after 5 months residence, it's probably a good
idea to stop & take stock over winter. i spent the spring/summer getting the
veggies etc going, putting in as many annual flowers, flowering
ground-covers, & other cheering things in small patches as i could, chopping
down inappropriately-located trees & planting appropriate trees, etc, &
thinking about where i am going with this. but as i said, i can't think up
things which aren't there, so i've reached a standstill. maybe best for now
to work on the beds which are there while i think about things.

any ideas or advice? how do you do things at your place?
thanks!
kylie