Rehearse your reasons, and convince yourself.

Stick "under construction" signs in the areas that displease you! Well, i'm almost serioius. Jo-when the rains don't come, you just have to suck it up, and be a little kinder to yourself. I learned that summer before last when I kept everything alive, barely, with bath water. And buckets in the showers to catch shower water. We were under a total watering ban, and it didn't rain for weeks.

Interestingly--event hough I thought my garden looked awful, people kept complimenting me on it. They didn't see the sad plants and gasping grass--they only saw the lantana blooming it's fool head off, and the lillies, and the cleome that laughed at the weather.

But I DO understand!

melanie

Jo-
Hire teens to weed?? weeding is easier than babysitting, too . . . Just today I got my neighbor girl (14) to weed once a week for 4 hrs for a client of mine in the neighborhood who cannot afford my 30.00/hr labor rate. This girl will weed all morning for 5.00/hr. My client is happy, my neighbor girl is happy, and I am happy. A win-win situation.

Lots of girls(and some boys) babysit. Find out who does this in your area and offer them a weeding job. Same kind of kids who will babysit, will weed. Both are caretaking jobs . . .
G.

I look at those spots in the garden with my "future" vision. I never see it as it looks now, I see it as it will be down the road, when the shrubs are full size.

I try to do the five gallon bucket weeding marathon each day. Grab bucket, my asparagus weeder (or what ever your favorite tool is) and weed until the bucket is full and quit. Only takes about 15 minutes and you feel like you have accomplished something.

"The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step".

Perception does not necessarily reflect reality and the little things you see today get even smaller in time.
The idea about hiring a young person for weeding is a great one! It's not really hard work and they earn some spending money. I wonder if $5 and hour is the going rate...I mean it sounds good to me, I wonder if it does to a young person.

I think the other advice is good to. Don't look at the sum total of what you want to do - it's too great. The giant redwood comes down one chop at a time. Try and do a little bit on a regular basis and you'll be amazed at how all those little bits add up.

Above all, I don't think you want those 'ditch' lillies (would those be tiger lillies?) everywhere, unless you'll let it all go to field.

AbbeysDad, ditch lilies are Tawny Daylilies, for their habit of turning up on the side of the road. Actually have Tiger Lilies as well.
I went out this morning and did some cleaning up in one of the troublesome areas, and it looks much better. Another truckload of brush ready for the town shredder.
Thanks for the encouragement.
Jo

Just dropped in to see what this forum is about. Saw the part about paying teens to weed, it made me smile. My sister and I used to weed for all the Kool-Aid we could drink and a trip to Dairy-Queen. But kids weren't quite so sophisticated way back then.

It's a lot of work, but don't just let the weeds go. Every darn little weed produces zillions of seeds, and every one of them will sprout next spring! If nothing else, pick off any flowers before they set seed. After hoeing and removing the weeds, treat the area with a weed preventer, you will be glad you did.

Catkim--what sort of weed-preventoer? I've had very little success with corn gluten--and I am loather to use Preen because we live a few hundred feet up=hill from a permanent stream. I worry about the wildlife htat use/inhabit the stream. I am not against chemicals in PRINCIPLE--Round Up is a WONDERFUL thing--but have read that pre-emergents can be problematic for amphibian offspring.

melanie

Melanie-- I use a product called "Amaze" and also mulch that contains something, probably corn gluten. It really helps. However, my garden doesn't drain into anything but itself, so I haven't had to worry about amphibians -- wouldn't that be fun to have some! If it weren't for me watering, this plot would be dry as the desert. Ha, but the weeds would still grow!!

I made the mistake of letting the weeds grow when we did a remodel project in 1997 and I've been paying for it ever since.

I hear you. We bought this house in '97 or was it '98? ANYHOO--it was hip (and in some places chest) deep in weeds. I am NOT exagerating. And I am still paying for it. I'll have to check out amaze....if it weren't for the permanent creek in the backyard I'd be preening for sure!

melanie

I'm looking at the Amaze package, and the active ingredients are benefin and oryzalin, whatever that is. Under environmental hazards, the directions read: "Do not apply directly to water, or to areas where surface water is present, or to intertidal water areas below the mean high water mark. Do not contaminate water when disposing of equipment washwaters or rinsate."

That's a pretty benign label compared to all those things that say "TOXIC TO BIRDS, FISH, AND OTHER WILDLIFE..." and make it sound like you'll go blind, suffocate, and die if you use it.