We're also having a productive 'clean up' season. The town did our street over this summer and left a mess along our property line, so we've been steadily working on that all summer to one degree or another. Yesterday, we finally finished the last of it. Mulch and new grass seed is all down.

We did a lot of pruning this season. First in the spring and last week, we finally got around to taking down a few smaller branches on a Maple that were hanging over the driveway. So lots to put out for yard waste pick up. We replaced the fence along one lot line. And we're reworking the front bed, again. Added some Hydrangea 'Little Lime' and new lily bulbs, a new Hardy Hibiscus, more grasses and spring bulbs are on the way.

I think my front bed is going to be so ready for the spring, I'll barely have to do anything to it, once spring gets here. [g]. And that's a first.

Looks like you have a lot of privacy from your mature trees.

wow sounds like you've gotten quite a bit done!

I already need to make time to blow the leaves again haha.

Glad you were able to repair the damage left by the town, we had a similar problem with National Grid before. Oh I'd love to see how the fence and front garden! We need to replace our fence all the way around (ugh), I'm constantly reworking my front garden too because I feel like I'm never happy with it. Also have decided that I'm going to extend the side garden now that it took only two years to fill the whole thing up lol. Going to make it longer by about 15 feet, it's already about 15 feet wide so it's going to be a nice huge addition (currently the area it would extend into is just an unused area of lawn between our house and the neighbors).

Going to take my hardy hibiscus out of their pots and put them in here, as well as my potted lilacs, potted roses, and going to add some small evergreen shrubs and spring bulbs.

Ooh Little Lime Hydrangea is beautiful, I'm sure it'll look gorgeous with the lily bulbs and hardy hibiscus! You'll have to let us all see how it turns out.

Yes we have a TON of trees on our property, we're on a little over half an acre and about half of that is trees. We're actually planning on getting quite a few removed, not because we don't like trees (we love them) but because there are quite a few dead/dying trees up on our hill that loom over our house (not visible in these photos). So we're going to take out the dangerous and/or dying ones, get a little more breathing room between our house and the trees. I have a friend who's going to give us some sassafrass saplings that we'll use to fill in where we took some trees out. - woo so much to do!

Hi Kali - I guess we did get more done this growing season than most years. It’s nice to feel a little caught up instead of always feeling behind.

We had a strip the width of the property by about 3ft that they dug up putting in the new street. Most of our neighbors only had about a foot on the other side of the street and one neighbor has about the same as we did. They came back and filled in but there was a grade difference and it’s made a difference in my ability to get in and out of my bed on the street side. It’s more sloped and I can’t stand comfortably on that edge. Then they filled in with junky soil that they dug up when digging up the old street. I didn’t realize it until I went to put a shovel in and it wouldn’t go past 3 inches deep. I pulled out buckets of rocks and lots of chunks of asphalt too. And they were late filling, so by the time I got it ready to sow seed, it was about 10 days ago and now it’s going to be 31 overnight. It hasn’t germinated yet, so I guess I’m not going to see any grass before winter. But I’ve heard much worse horror stories from other homeowners. I can live with the change and it’s great to have a new street. I’m just glad to have that all finished.

We have stockade fence on two sides, and post and rail along the back lot line, because it lines up with the back of everyone’s property that is just landscaping, so it extends our view without losing any privacy really. We replaced the post and rail along the back in spring, and were about to replace one side of the stockade fence a couple of weeks ago and the neighbor’s 60+ year old Maple lost a limb that landed partly on the fence. We got that cleaned up on our side, but we’re now going to have to postpone the fence this year because we discovered they have a lake of poison ivy along the fence in the back corner, that we were unaware of. The person putting up our fence, is very sensitive to poison ivy, so we’re going to put that on the back burner and hope we can get to it in the spring. Imagine, the week before we were going to start it! LoL

I’ll try to remember to post a photo of the new bed in the spring.

My only full sun is in my front bed, so anything that I want to grow that requires it has to go in that bed. It’s just big enough to enjoy the different changes, and not too big to be too much work to make the changes. So I enjoy the variability. I don’t feel I change the rest of the property all that much unless something is not doing well. Sometimes you plant a bed and it just doesn't work out the way you expected. I think most gardeners make pretty frequent changes, don't they?

Yes, it doesn’t take long to fill in once you start adding plants. I added lasagna bed additions to a few borders in my backyard a few times until I used up all the space I had. [g]. A 15ft addition sounds like a nice new spot for more gardening. I like the sound of your additions to that bed. Roses, lilacs, hibiscus and evergreens with bulbs. Very pretty and fragrant! It must be full sun.

A half acre is a nice size, I have half that and I used to complain that it wasn’t large enough, but the older I get, now it seems just the right size for us to manage. [g]. A half acre allows you to have that nice border of trees, which we don’t have here.

Are you hiring someone to remove your trees?

I had a friend with sassafras trees. I think their fall color was nice, if I am remembering the right tree. They sound like a nice tree to have.

Oh my god I would have been so mad at someone ripping up the edge of my lawn - I feel like one of those little yappy dogs when someone touches their property lol.

There are many pros to having smaller gardens, you can change just a couple things and get a whole new look! And definitely, I think us gardeners, for all our patience, are very sporadic and impatient because we want to try all sorts of new things and keep changing everything. At least that's what I've found.

Yes we're going to have a professional company remove the trees there's no way we could do it ourselves (white pines that I'm sure are 100ft tall, close to the house, and a big slope). It'll be well worth the money though. we've had a few arborists come out to give quotes to remove the trees and regrade the lawn.

I have to say that tonight I realized I'm pretty damn satisfied with the accomplishments I've had as a novice gardener. I think I'm happiest about getting the "bones" of each of the gardens down. Meaning - when I very first started I didn't quite understand how to properly plan a garden, in addition I didn't understand the massive importance evergreens play in a landscape. Today I finally got all the evergreens I want (for the moment) planted up, I can't wait until everything fills in in a year or two (or five). Here's what I've been able to do this year (keep in mind these scraggly gardens are only 2 years old lol):

Front Left Garden (going to move that maiden grass more to the right to help cover the foundation).

Front Garden Above:

Front Right Garden:

Front Right Garden Above:

Kali - You should be happy with your progress in the garden. You’re lucky to have a property that you can start at the beginning and make it the way you want it.

Mature trees and evergreens are the background, for sure, don’t see how you can do without them really, unless you have a meadow, rolling hills and stone walls. :-) In that first photo, is that a rose and what are the purple flowers - campanula or veronica or? I love grasses and evergreens together.

In your front right garden, that looks almost exactly the same size as the bed to the R of my front door too. I think you really need the depth out to the beginning of the steps. Do I see Hellebores?

You will be surprised how fast the time goes by before the new plants start filling in. You turn around and they’re huge. [g]. One of my shortcomings as a gardener has always been judging distance. You’d think I would have learned that I can’t eyeball things and measured instead, but, it took me awhile. I ended up moving a lot of plants.

The only gardening I did to begin with was vegetable gardening when our kids were little and it wasn’t until years later, I started to notice that the neighbors trees had all grown up, giving too much shade and competition from Maple roots for my established shrubs. They were in serious decline. Not to mention the thousands of Maple seedlings we had to deal with every spring.

And in our front yard, we only have 30ft from the street to the front door and it was one straight broken walkway to the street with weedy, scraggly hedges on both sides. So we started over and ripped out just about everything but the lawn and one big Taxus in the front.

This was the front garden as it was for a few years. I was surprised when I looked it up that it was in 2013.

No more weedy hedges [g] ....next year it will be less exuberant and more controlled.

And that is a blue holly and boxwood against the house, in a bed the size of yours and they started out as small as yours are now.

In our back, we ripped out old Spireas, Forsythias and Philadelphus and I don't remember what else and added some native shrubs, Cletha and Oakleaf Hydrangea. These started out very small as well and are now mature size...

We spent the whole day out in the yard yesterday. I think we're about finished. The hoses aren't put away yet and two rain barrels still need to be used up and put away, but we planted all the potted plants hanging around the yard and added bonus daffodil bulbs that I dug up in early summer where they weren't blooming from overcrowding. I got so far as to move a plant out of the way for roses being delivered in April and pre-dug the hole for two of them, so in the spring, it will be an easier job. I've never been that ready for spring before. lol. I have one small order of bulbs coming probably next week and once they are in, that's the end of the 2018 gardening season. :-)

I concentrated on getting the front garden just the way I wanted it this season, and next year, I'm going to have to work on one long border that is a complete mess.

Prairiemoon - that picture is absolutely beautiful. Every element. I hope you don't mind if I save it in my "inspiration file". Thank you for posting it.

Thanks Skibby, glad you like it. Save away. I was surprised that the Clethra did as well as it has done in as much shade and dryness as it has. The foliage is very clean and attractive. The Oakleaf Hydrangea some years, gets too dry there. This year it has some brown edges this time of year. The bird bath is busy with birds from spring to fall and then when we get a freeze, I bring in the ceramic pot and saucer and leave two plastic saucers with water out there.

prairiemoon - yes we are definitely cautious about taking out too many trees, luckily we do have a nice hill so the plan is to remove only the pines, (leave the oak and other trees) any dead or dangerous trees. our neighbor with a similar backyard did the same thing and it looks gorgeous - just enough trees for privacy but enough clear land to have a good yard. It's hard to see from the pictures but we have trees completely surrounding our land which is awesome, and we're definitely leaving the trees in the front of the house.

thank you for your kind words about my garden! I've been trying to be patient haha. unfortunately I do not have any hellebores, the price scares me away from them honestly because I'm afraid I'll kill them and waste the money. I do have in that garden: small hydrangeas, lily turf, scotch broom, azealea, sea pink, sedum, juniper, Columbine, and a couple leafy perennials I forget haha. I do agree I need to increase the width of the garden to the steps :)

so glad you've gotten your front garden complete! it's a great feeling when that happens isn't it?

houzz won't let me edit my comment but I meant to add your pictures of your garden are gorgeous!!

KC - I love trees and wish I had a property with mature gorgeous trees. My neighbors have all Silver Maples, which I have come to dislike due to their roots that travel for water and fertility. Oaks are supposed to be nicely deep rooted and easier to grow a shade garden under, at least from what I read. I've never had them on my property. Great that you have a neighbor who has already done something similar to what you want to do to see how it came out.

Since you have a slope, if you ever want to do a vegetable garden, they say the best location for one is a hill or slope facing south.

On your front bed, I was pointing out that you already had widened the bed to the bottom of the steps. It looks like a good size for foundation plantings. Not too narrow like some I've seen.

Don't be afraid of Hellebores. I've been growing them for years. They are not easy to kill. [g] And they are slow to mature, so if you can find some young Hellebores, for less money, it takes a few years for them to grow to size where they are blooming well and filling in. I traded for some at a plant swap once and that's how long it took for me. I've also bought them reasonably priced at local plant sales in the spring. They get expensive if you buy some of the newer hybrids. Bluestone offers some of those on sale sometimes. They make a nice shade plant.

So good luck. Looks like time for garden work is about done for me. My reseeded strip along the street has germinated and I have baby grass. I'm done for the season. Enjoy your garden!