This is what my future flowerbed looks like; lots of grass and what is going to be a long weekend.

This "little" patch of grass is wedged between the sidewalk and the garage.

Day One: Saturday – We managed to get the sod up by hand and with help of shovels. Please, if you ever hear me talking about making another flowerbed, remind me of this moment and how much it absolutely sucks to dig up grass!

Sunday – Day two. Yep, that's right ... it took us a whole afternoon to get just the grass up, and we were exhausted.

Once all the sod was up, my hubby dug down around the edge and we started on the border. We put down gardener's cloth below the edging to help keep the weeds out as well. Once the border was cut, leveled, and screwed into place I raked the ground and made it level. We laid down gardener's cloth over the rest of the newly exposed ground. Then we put a whole truck load of compost on top of the gardener's cloth to make a nice big flowerbed.

The finished product! We leveled out the compost. The plants I had already patiently waiting for their new home. I placed them where I wanted and then planted accordingly making sure to mix the ground with the compost so that all my plants get plenty of natural fertilizer.

It's a shady spot, so I chose "tough plants" like hostas that do well in the shade. I plan to throw in a few annuals to bring in some color, but these shown below are all perennials so they'll come back every year. I finally have a flower garden to put my garden decorations in!

I'm sure I'm getting old and have no business doing hard physical labor when I spend most of my regular days sitting at a desk. I am sore in muscles I didn’t know existed, and my hands are beat up and blistered.

I love my new flowerbed! And thanks to the hubby for working so hard with me this weekend to get it done! This isn't the only thing we had going on, and so we had to work on it in-between the other weekend activities.

If you have any really cool flower ideas that do great in shady areas, please let me know, as I'm always looking for new ideas!

A big hello from frosty Nebraska. Thanks for dropping by again. Today I’d like to tell you about old Rose. She started her life back in 1965 when the house I now live in was built. She was just a twig in back yard but decided to be the best Rosebud tree she could be. Years past and she grew tall and majestic. Every Spring she draped lovely purple color all over her foliage.

When I came along and made her my own she was about 20 years old and had grown big and strong. She had grown to be about three feet across the base and had many branches that shaded the yard. She was a proud tree that beatified the yard wonderfully well. Then the ants came marching one by one (old Cub Scout song). Carpenter ants took up residence in her core. Before I even knew that they were there her center had been eaten in many of the branches. A large branch that fell exposed the damaged internal part of Rose.

With saws and axes my friends and I trimmed her up with tender care in hopes that those pesky old ants could be controlled. Alas another branch came down as Old Rose tried her best to keep her branches up high and not let the internal rot keep her from blooming.

Sad was the day when she just couldn’t bloom much and stood there with dead branches poking into the sky that once reflected her bright plumage. With a little help from my friends we started the demise of Old Rose. Slowly and reverently piece by piece we laid her to rest on the back yard never to bloom again.

There remained only one thing left to do and that was to remove her stump. Over the course of a year a friend made it his mission to spend Saturdays digging and chopping around the root system to remove her stump. With the purchase of “Big Burtha”, a 460 Magnum Stihl, the last of her stump was removed and gently laid on the back yard patio waiting to be cremated.

Now all that’s left of the once majestic Rose is fire pit wood on the patio. However the gaping hole left behind will become one of the summer projects. The plan is to make the area into an outdoor patio with fire pit. The last hurrah for Old Rose will be to warm the hearts of those around the fire pit telling stories of the life and times of Old Rose the once majestic tree that once stood high in the sky on the very spot we are enjoying.

I hope you all enjoyed the tale of Old Rose and how she grew up, lived and died. The lesson here to learn is to be the best we can be with the gifts and talents in our possession. Come on back again, and we’ll sit and spin a yarn or two. Oh yeah, and the coffee’s always on.