#semi-native. there are some lillies in there for my mom

[lupinus-bicolor]

i love my lil native garden <3<3<3

[broodsys]

excuse me while i dive into excessive detail abt my garden :')

cracks knuckles

so. so. we moved here smth like 9 years ago, at which point the previous owners had a chicken coop and wooden deck taking up most of the backyard. (side note: i'm almost certain there wasn't adequate space for the chickens)

credit goes to my mom for a lot of the major renovation into what it is now. the wooden deck was rotting and becoming increasingly dangerous, so with my brothers helping they all tore down the entire deck. it took a lot of time to physically stabilize and level the yard enough for it to be at least semi-functional after that, but we eventually ended up with a section of paver stones and a wide area of open soil

so much trial and error during these stages that im not going into bc im writing a blog post, not a novella, but suffice to say my current success was not easily or quickly won. i think the major turning point was when i did a "lasagna"/sheet mulch on the would-be garden area to enrich the soil, bc that was rly the first, big mark i made on the area

from there, it's grown finally into two planting beds made of those concrete blocks with 2 big holes cut out, which is important bc i wanted to and now have planted a ton in these "planting pockets" as i call them. they're marvelously appropriate for microgreens and also to keep track of small bulbs i want to see bloom but can't decide where to place permanently, lmao

in the last, idk, maybe 2 years ive rly leaned into it hard. now i have prolific blackberries, and i'm cutting down all the blackberries along the side yard after this season so the marionberry can replace it - natives > invasives, after all. (not that i can stop the blackberries from growing - they're all over the place, incl a lot of other ppl's property and sneaking over)

at the same time, my blueberry trio will have thoroughly established and my red raspberry should be doing great, considering how many berries we got off it this year, the year we bought it. goji berries are growing but slowly, so i'm not expecting much, but the gooseberry is taking off again. so wild, i love it. and the prickly pear cactus suffered root rot and i almost lost it, but i believe ive successfully rooted the topmost segment. it'll take time but i should eventually be able to try the cactus fruit. years tho.

also all my strawberry groundcover layers are doing rly well, and i get the occasional strawberry off them, tho they're mostly for evaporation control. it's still a challenge to grow a lot of veggies bc it's just not hot enough for them here, but im still doing rly good overall

oh, and my lemon tree is doing outrageously well... this year it's putting out leaves longer and wider than my hand. that's new. and the baby lemon tree i grew from seed from the first-ever harvested lemon from the original tree is putting out So Fucking Much new growth, i'm thrilled

my various planting areas are doing super well, too. rly beginning to fill them in. i have pink jasmine trellising by the front door and it's getting so full; two kinds of lilac along the front path; newly, a pretty and fragrant pink-blooming weigela shrub. three canna lillies (which aren't actual lillies, which i refuse to grow anywhere bc they're immensely toxic to cats) all with different flowers, and for the first time i found some seeds before they had developed their rly hard outer shell, so i'm trying to grow some more from seed. exciting!

im quite confident that the front long & skinny & hella shallow planter will have its usual forest of arugula, endive, and sage - but will hopefully also have miners lettuce. oh and the mum that somehow became a giant shrub in a tiny pot set in said long planter. ive had to brace it multiple times, it's sheer size is unreal

and im discovering that hellebores in our area remain evergreen thru summer after they're 2nd-3rd established year. just the leaves ofc, but it's still rly cool, i'm so proud of them. and i finally have some outdoor ferns that have stabilized and come back multiple times!

[princess-onion-ring]

I was tagged by @stuff-and-star-wars-thangs to list 11 facts about myself. Thanks fren!

1. I have some crazy allergies! Along with your standard cat/dog allergies, and seasonal allergies, I can’t have chicken, turkey, peas, pineapples, almonds, chickpeas/garbanzo beans, celery, and probably some other stuff that I can’t remember. The reactions vary in severity, though the worst is probably chicken. If I eat it, even a little bit, I get hives on the inside of my throat going down to my stomach. It’s painful and lasts all night, until I usually wake up with chills. That’s when I know it’s over. The chills thing seems to happen with all of them, except pineapple, which is the mildest, and only gives me mouth hives. Fun stuff. Thankfully, none of them are bad enough to kill me, but every exposure makes the reaction worse, so who knows? Morbid, but anyways haha -

2. I took French in high school, but I can’t remember much of the stuff I learned since it’s been so long and I haven’t practiced since sophomore year. My teacher was amazing, though. She was probably the best teacher I’ve ever had tbh.

3. My favorite My Chemical Romance album is Three Cheers For Sweet Revenge, though I love them all c:

4. I love dying my hair. Currently, my hair is this bright red/raspberry color, but next month, once this dye is out (it’s manic panic so it’s semi-permanent), I’m going for a more orangish-red (aka party poison) color.

5. Aliens are awesome, and I’ve always loved them! When my sisters and I were little, while they were obsessed with disney princesses, I was into Lilo and Stitch and E.T. and other sci fi movies. Basically I’ve been a nerd for a long time, fam.

6. I have two little sisters and one older brother and I love them soooooo much.

7. My heritage is mainly English & Italian on my mom’s side (her mom is French, and her mom’s mom was French, but basically everyone before her was Italian) (my mom’s dad’s family has been in Georgia/the southeast in general for a while, but moved here sometime in the 1700s from England), and Irish on my dad’s side (his dad’s side moved here, again, sometime in the 1700s from Ireland, and his mom’s side has been in North Carolina practically since the beginning of time haha) (i think they moved there from England, but I’m not entirely sure). We also have a little tiny bit of Japanese in there somewhere, and quite a bit of native american. My thirteenth great grandmother on my mom’s side is Pocahontas, and I think that’s super awesome.

8. I’m super super super pale. Like you don’t even know, man. Also I have a lot of freckles. They get more prominent during the summer time, and if I spend time outside a lot.

9. My favorite dinner is pizza, which makes working at a pizza place a serious struggle. All I want to do at work is eat everything.

10. My ‘celebrity twin’ is Evangeline Lilly.

11. I want to travel all over the world, but the #1 place I’d like to live is Liverpool, England. Either there or Epcot, but people can’t actually live there...yet.

Tagging: @dillpickleofdarkness, @princess-hiro, @beepala, @lovegoodloki1048, @thetenthtardis, @pacehumefaraday, and whoever else wants to do it. :)