If you’ve been following the blog for a while, you may have noticed my posting has been rather sporadic for the past year or so. I used to post quite regularly, but life got pretty chaotic after my second was born. I’m trying to get back into a regular rhythm of posting, and when I went to the old WordPress site and my Google drive to clean and organize, I found some photos that I think I meant to post in a part 3 “final front yard makeover” kind of update back in 2021 or 2022 that I never got around to. Whoops.
So we’re just gonna do it now! Enjoy some pretty garden pics and a super satisfying before and after.
Before
Our front yard was kind of a mangy mess when we bought the house. Lots of overgrown ground cover and a bush hedge at the front. The echinacea and rudbeckia were the only flowers the previous owner had planted, along with some daylillies in front of our basement window that I had already gotten rid of. It was uninspiring to say the least.
After a few years of working mainly on the backyard, I decided to tackle the front, first by removing nearly everything that was previously planted. I left the rudbeckia and echinacea, because they were perfectly healthy, reliable perennials that did well despite the shady situation in front of our house.
Over the years, I’ve tried growing many perennials that just would not take. Tulips never naturalized, I think because our front yard gets too wet in the spring. The weigelas never bloomed, I think because it was just too shady for them to thrive. The hydrangeas always suffered because despite most of the front garden being “part shade” it was still too hot and sunny for them!
After
Through a lot of trial and error, I’ve discovered that roses do quite well despite the limited sunlight (which is great because they are my favourite landscape flower). I’ve also found that peonies, phlox, delphiniums and nepeta do quite well here, and reliably come back year after year with little care required.
I’ve also embraced the use of annuals to help fill out the empty spots. Petunias, dianthus and marigolds are a favourite of mine to fill up space with lots of colour quickly. I also love using coleus and dusty miller to add unique colours and textures into the garden bed.
Keep in mind, this was the garden from a couple of summers ago at this point. Some of what you see here is gone already. They just weren’t thriving or they weren’t right for the space. And I’m already cringing, thinking about what will probably not come back this spring…
I finally caved and planted some astilbe and bleeding hearts for the shadiest spots in the garden, despite not really loving the look of them, and I think the astilbe probably died because I didn’t water them enough through the dry spells. Whoops.
Nevertheless, the garden is constantly evolving, and despite things dying or not doing well in our wet/dry/shady/sunny front yard, it’s always a pleasure to experiment with different plants and create something new every year.
I’m so excited for spring!
xoxo
