Papa’s Garden(s)
Without going into extreme detail I have a few garden areas worth describing.
Papa’s Yard
Our house is 40+ years old and located in the worlds 1st planned community. We can be found at the end of a double caldisac. The house is an unassuming partial-brick 2 story house with a 2 car garage, 4 bedrooms 3 bathrooms a full in-law apartment in the basement (my Mom lives there). It has plenty of room on the inside and many upgrade projects awaiting my attention. The outside is my happy land- the property is a quirky shaped lot just a bit over a half an acre. One of the previous owners made a good attempt to landscape the property but it dated the house.
The front yard is mostly lawn and the area in front of the living room is generously landscaped with climbing roses, pom-poms, day lilies, monkey grass and a nice sized Japanese Maple tree. The far side of the driveway is flanked with a few flowering trees and the area between the sidewalk and road has 2 matured maple trees maintained over the years by the weather and community tree trimmers.
Sides of the house are very utility in their landscaping- one side of the house has a flowering hedge that requires major trimming at least 4 times a year. Closest to the house on the side with the hedge is home to a timber planting bed that had a mish-mash of bushes and self seeding plants. There are also 3 well developed butterfly bushes on that side of the house that are viewable from the kitchen window. Moving to the other side of the house you find the plain, mostly lawn covered path to the back of the house. The backyard is an amazing gardening mecca. The yard borders the fairway of a par 5 golf hole on a quite, rolling course. On the opposite side of the fairway there is a small stream lined with a shallow wooded area that opens on the other side to another community.
The golf course is very well maintained year-round. Apart from the tee, greens and fairway areas they have invested well in the landscaping. From my yard you can almost see the tee area of the hole but it is shielded (and we are shielded from sliced drives!) with a series of evergreens and small to medium size trees. The “rough” separating the bottom of my property from the fairway is full of ornamental grasses, trees, bushes, vines and various other plantings and landscape elements. There is no clear indication where my yard ends and the golf course begins (more on that later). One bottom corner of my yard has a sizable area landscaped in the same design to blur the boundaries. The opposite corner of the yard has an imposing, character filled maple tree that reaches well over 50′ into the sky and shades a nice portion of the yard.
My mother’s walk-out-basement in-law apartment looks out into a part of the yard with a brick bordered rose garden with a small container pond in its center. Offset from the center of the house and a bit away from the house is the most amazing looking Japanese maple tree I have ever seen- some say it was the reason I bought the house. The rich red leaved maple flows from the top ridge of the yard near the house along a somewhat steep hill. The tree is a focal point of the yard when viewed from any of the rear windows or when looking towards my house from the gold course. There is a winding set of stairs going from the outside ground-level part of the yard to the area where the basement apartment walks-out. Last spring we had the old, decrepit deck that spanned 3/4 of the length of the house ripped out and had an addition built on the house (see sunroom description below). The area under the sunroom and adjoining deck is open and has both a deck area for my mom and a deep shade garden ferns and other woodland plants.
Again- this is just a general description. See my post and articles for more elaborate descriptions, stories, how-tos and pictures of all of these areas.
Papa’s Sunroom
In 2007 we began the process of having a 14′ x 16′ sun room built as an attachment to our house. Its made of factory built panels, floor-to-ceiling glass windows, sliding doors on each side (one leading to the yard and the other to a 16′ x 12′ deck with a hot tub and sitting area), and peaked roof. We wanted a room that took advantage of our spectacular yard and view and added to our functional living space. It also serves as home to a few dozen orchids, countless African violets, a few terrariums and various potted and hanging plants and flowers. There is a unique double fan and light fixture tucked into the peak of the room and the floor is a simple but elegant tile looking laminate. Heating and cooling of the room is handled by a stand alone unit that occupies one of the small lower panels of the room. We have a small couch, huge rolling footstool with internal storage and a love seat-recliner as the “people furniture” for the room. My wife has a black floor stand reading light and a throw rug in the center of the room.
The room entrance is off our eating area/kitchen and has no door or other separator- we wanted it open and airy. All of the framing of the room panels is white and beige. The ceiling is a white textured panel material and nothing requires long term maintenance such as painting. Every panel of glass is triple pained with argon gas sealed between the pains of glass. This is an excellent insulator and will pay for itself in heating and cooling costs in little time.
We have a variety of plant surfaces throughout the room including iron shelves, antique planter stands and modern iron shelves and tables. I also have multiple spots where I added ceiling hooks. One of my favorite additions to the room is a large Victorian style terrarium that I setup with a nice selection of plants and a fountain.
Other Places
Other gardening areas include my sun filled office and the rest of my house. My office has floor to ceiling windows (12 foot high) and many plants. Plants in my office range from typical stuff: spider plants, begonias, pothos to the less common: hoya, orchids and African violets. Many of my plants have been reproduced through cuttings and now have kin found in people’s offices company wide. Apart from my yard and sunroom I also have quite a few plant elsewhere at home. Our kitchen window gets great sun and I recently installed shelves on each side of the window to hold mini and micro african violets. Less sunny areas of the house have shade tollerant house plants and I even have 2 planted aquariums I consider gardens.
