happy place

Everyone has a happy place. Currently mine is my small backyard in North Portland. Nothing matters in the world when I'm back there. It's been a major undertaking to turn it into a space that both my husband and I enjoy. When we purchased our house the backyard was a pit. The grass was dead, the dog that lived here dug many holes and placed many gross things into them, there were overgrown trees, no plants and a giant slab of broken concrete with a lovely aluminum awning over it from the 70's. After my husband rented a jackhammer, sod cutter, rototiller and hauled many loads off to the recycling center we began to have a start. It's been almost 3 summers and it's still a battle. I planted some things along the fence last year and hardly any of them survived. It's very disheartening when you put hard work into planting and watering and everything just dies! Sounds a little like my chickens. I got a wild hair last night and bought some new plants, took out all of the lame puny ones that had been haunting me. They were awful! I love all plants and flowers but when it looked like Home Depot gone bad, I lost it. I want to love my garden. I want to love my yard. I did compost a few plants last night but it was so the others got more positive attention from me. Why should I pour my heart into a 50 cent primrose if I don't like them? I do. They are just not my style. I'm a modern person and modern people need modern plants. Modern plants go with the modern patio that we built to go with our 1920 craftsman style bungalow. Any how, we are working on many projects and by the end of the summer I hope to like my tiny house even more. Paint is next!