This Is The Year

April 27, 2026

My garden has really good bones but it had been left to its own devices for about ten years before I bought it. It was getting pretty unruly. I have wanted to get my hands in there since the very first day but the past five summers saw all of my energy go into painting. But not this year. This year is all about gardening. And I am so excited.

I have some before-and-after photos for you along with some of the plans that I have. I think we should call them before-and-middle photos because the current photos make it look like I’m ruining things rather than fixing them. I promise things are getting better rather than worse. At least, that’s what I keep telling myself. The photos on the left were taken May 7, 2021 and the ones on the right were taken April 29, 2026. Spring was much further along that year. The magnolias had been out for a week and there was so much green. This year the magnolias are still very much in bud and brown is still the colour on offer.

The tour will start to the left of my back stairs and go clockwise around the garden.

The planter box on the driveway was rotting so I had to get rid of it. I moved the rhododendron to the back yard but I’m sad to report that it died. You can’t see it in the picture but I’ve painted the driveway side of the shed. This summer I’ll do the side in the photograph. I will admit that the wood platform doesn’t look as good as the longer driveway and planter did but that’s where I stack my wood and I couldn’t be without the wood stove. This was the only spot big enough to put it. Both of the honeysuckles flanking the path are still there. I had to cut them so the ladders and staging wouldn’t get tangled up when I was painting but they’re still happy and growing. The willow branches on the platform are going to be woven into obelisks to support them. That’s the plan anyway.

Just look at how clean and tidy the patio stones are in front of the shed in the old photo. (I’m not doing a very good job in convincing you that things are better now than they were before, am I?) I’ll be getting those back in shape this summer. All of the stones in this picture (and scattered around the garden) will be put to better use. There is a bit of a patio space on the right where I plan to put a bird bath. The rest of the stones will be moving to the bottom of the stairs to make a patio space there. I’ll make some small pathways through the garden with any stones that are leftover. The composter is a new addition. It’s not very attractive but I like having free compost so maybe I can grow something to hide it a bit. Grasses would be great but it’s a really shady spot. If you have any ideas for what I could grow, let me know. I’m all ears. There used to be a lilac there but it was really scraggy. Probably because it was so shady. The big bundle of green on the top of the fence in the old photo is a wild rose. I should have dug it out when I did the fence but I thought it might be okay. I was wrong. It’s wild in every sense of the word. It needs to go. The hydrangea is a real beauty. I gave it a good pruning that first year and a little bit of pruning every year after that. It’s hard to see in the old photo but the trunks were all tangled and rubbing on each other. They have some breathing room now but still hold those interesting shapes that grew through neglect. The bushy plants scattered all around are just weeds. No loss there. I’ve put in solomon’s seal, lungwort, ferns, bleeding hearts, pink mallow and false geranium. I also relocated a burning bush and some violets from other parts of the garden.

This before is also looking better than the after. I’m hanging my head in shame. You might not agree with my choices but this is what happened. I took out the two evergreens. They were scraggy, top heavy and blocked the view of most of the garden. You can see in the new photo how much garden is actually there. The giant green bush at the back was a forsythia. It was thick and wild. I trimmed it right back the first year but it was such a well established shrub that it grew back with a vengeance and was sitting right in the middle of the best sunny spot so I ended up taking it out. Behind that are some maple trees that were left to grow under and through the fence. We removed those when we put in the new fence. There is a dark pink weigela that I kept. I didn’t even find that until the third summer because things were so thick back there. I’ve added a lilac tree that I moved from the side of the house. I left the burning bush in but after everything else got pruned back, trimmed out or removed, it had so much light and energy that it doubled in size after a few years. I took it out. I saved a small section and put it in the garden by the composter. I also have a white potentilla shrub which I love so that stayed. I put in a red Japanese maple, some rhubarb, sedum, irises, a yellow climbing rose, hellebore, lady’s mantle, allum, peonies, lamb’s ear, day lilies, white anemones and some herbs. There are forget-me-nots that come up every year. Those aren’t going anywhere. There will be another little patio circle where the Adirondack chair is. I’ll paint the chair pink to match the back door. It will help to add some colour back there. I also have a curly willow tree, dahlias, daisies (thank you, Rita!) poppies, daffodils and a pink Japanese anemone to add.

By the time summer rolled around that first year, I couldn’t even get through the garden to go down the side of the house. In my memory, the patio area was clear and then a wall of green jungle rose up and wouldn’t let anything past. It looks pretty empty now but I’m confident that it will look good in the end. I’ve added a clothes line and a stoop. For the twelve years I lived in the big house, I didn’t have a clothesline. I missed it so much. In the new photo you can see just how many rocks I have. There should be enough to do what I’m planning.

I’ll be keeping my fingers crossed, rubbing my lucky rabbit’s foot and hoarding four-leaf clovers in the hopes that the next set of photos really does look better than those original ones.