Ingalls

It’s official.  Our household is finally complete.  As of Saturday night, a garden gnome has taken up residence in our yard.

His name is Ingalls, and he hitched a ride here in a housewarming gift bag from our good friends Jim and Alyson*.  Rosy of cheek and blue of eye, he’s surprisingly well-mannered for a gnome, most of whom, I understand, are rather short-tempered when it comes to dealing with big people.

He’s a little camera-shy, but with a small box of Junior Mints and a promise to let him come in to watch HGTV from time to time, I did manage to coax him out of hiding for long enough to snap this quick picture by the hostas:

Isn’t he cute?  Don’t tell him I said that, though.  Gnomes hate to be called “cute”.  They prefer descriptors like “savage”, “mysterious”, and “ruggedly attractive in a Sam Elliott kind of way”.

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  Wasn’t it just yesterday that I was shouting in the streets about gnome liberation and the evils of oppressive gardening?  Well, in point of fact, it was three years ago.  Three years of growing dissatisfaction and disillusionment, watching the ideal of freedom for all gnomedom repeatedly smash up against the cold brick wall of reality.  Nobody in the GGLF talks about the ugly fallout of the gnome liberation movement: displaced gnomes starving in the streets, rejected by the simple woodland communities they used to call home, standing in unemployment lines (where many of them are trampled by unobservant human beings who, let’s face it, have the competitive edge when it comes to jobs hauling fifty pound bags of landscaping bark at Home Depot.)

I sensed intuitively that Ingalls didn’t want to talk about his past, but the haunted look in his eyes bespoke a life on the streets, running from stray cats and filching stale pizza crust out of the Valentino’s dumpster.  If I can give just one gnome a home, a job, and all the earthworms he can eat, how can that be inconsistent with my sincere desire to build a better life for all gnomekind?  After all, he’s free to come and go as he likes.

The Junior Mints are a token of solidarity.

So, the next time you come to visit us at (name of house yet to be decided), be sure to keep your eyes open for a glimpse of Ingalls among the rhodies and lilacs.

And for pity’s sake, watch where you step!

—

*Also in the bag was this perfectly wonderful wall plaque, which I adore.  We hung it up over the entrance to the downstairs, to remind us how it all ends:

The Plant Terminator

I have a black thumb.

I kill things.  Growing things.  Green growing things.

I don’t mean to, but there it is.  My house is the horticultural equivalent of the Bates Motel.

Plants occasionally check in, green and leafy, bursting with all the mysterious power of burgeoning life, only to check out weeks or, in tragic cases, mere days later, dessicated and decaying at the bottom of a Hefty bag.

It’s not like I don’t try.  I do.

I water them.  Maybe a little too much.  Then I worry that they’re looking waterlogged, and I stop watering them.  Maybe for too long.  Then I see that some of the leaves are dead, and I pinch them off.  Maybe too many.  Eventually, even the hardiest plant succumbs to my tender loving ministrations.

I give up.  For a while.  Until one day, a beautiful potted tulip sets my heart to yearning, or a well-meaning friend gifts me with another delicate fern, and the cycle begins again.

What can I say?  Hope springs eternal.

Anyway, my gruesome crimes as a mass plant murderer have gone largely unnoticed by the public, since most of them were committed behind closed doors.

But now.

Now.

Now we have….a yard.  With grass, and bushes, and a tree, and weird broken up bits of bark piled all along the sides of the porch.  And I’m pretty sure our new neighbors will notice when the soft spring green now shyly peeking up through the soil gives way to a smoking expanse of scorched earth.

Help me!

I went out yesterday and took photos of some of the things now growing in our precious .17 acres.  If you recognize any of them, or can tell me what to do with/to them to keep them from perishing, please leave me a highly detailed and informative message in the comments. Please.  Our neighbors’ property values are in your hands.

1. I did some googling and found out that this lovely thing is called a Corkscrew Willow. Isn't it pretty?

2. I'm fairly certain that this is a rosebush. A couple of people have mentioned that I need to prune it as soon as possible, and explained how to do it, but I think I might fare better with some written instructions.

3. Unidentified Bush-Type Growth A

4. Unidentified Bush-Type Growth B

5. Unidentified Bush-Type Growth C

6. Unidentified Bush-Type Growth D

7. There are several of these little patches of green stuff scattered around throughout the landscaping. Are they there on purpose? Perhaps aliens left them as a message? Or the Jolly Green Giant sneezed all over my yard?

8. As you can see, there are some green shoots coming up through the corpse of what is clearly a dead plant. Should I cut the dead part away? Or leave it as food for the new life chewing its way through to the sun?

9. This is just yucky. And dead. I'm pretty sure, anyway. But you should know that I did not do it this time. It was like this when we got here.

10. I think these are two different kinds of plants. They look like they might just need to be watered. Could I be so lucky?

And just a few more questions:

1) We have a hook for a hanging basket on the front porch.  What kind of plants do well up there in the air like that?  And can I buy a basket already planted, or will I need to fix it up myself?

2) I noticed weed and seed mix (or was it weed and feed?) on sale at the store.  Is that really necessary?  And when should I put it on?  And how should I put it on?  And how often do I need to water our lawn?  And why does crabgrass have such an ugly name?

3) How much would it cost to give this whole yard/planting/landscaping thing a pass and hire someone else to do it?  Because I am this close to covering the entire shebang with gravel and calling it a zen garden.