The corner bed

The corner bed is my next project. I worked already today on it and removed part of the Cannas and Elephant ears growing in there. I also removed half of the rocks you see in the front. Need them for my second succulent bed. I made the border much larger than it was before and will plant something that differs in size. Tall in the corner and shorter as I get to the front of the border. Not sure yet, what it will be. Before I can start thinking about it, I still have a lot of work ahead of me.
It just didn't look nice with the Elephant ears in the back and the Cannas in the front, because they had the same size and there was visually no interest.

This bed also need to get filled up with topsoil, it is a bit sunken, because I mixed a lot of yard waste into the soil last year and it decomposted so much, that it sunk almost 5 inch in height.
That's my job tomorrow.

I was in Lowes today and came across this beautiful palm. It was without a tag and the sales person didn't know if it's a winter hardy palm or not. I recognized it as a windmill palm but didn't say anything. I asked the supervisor for a discount, because I didn't want to waste $34.95 (the original price) for a palm that isn't winter hardy. She agreed to give me 50% off, so I got it for $17.00, which was a great deal for a windmill palm that size.

Extremely happy about my bargain purchase, I stopped at Walmart to get some mushrooms and Papaya for my torts, when I saw these lovely Crape Myrtles for only $11. Got a white one called Chocolate white. It will get only 8 feet tall and I planted it against the fence.

I had already this lovely pink one, which I bought last year at Lowes, also without tag, so I don't know which variety it is and how tall it gets, but the color sure is stunning.

It was a good day and I am planning on buying more rocks at the weekend to get an other huge bed beside the succulent bed next week going. I thought it's better to stay with rocks instead of wood borders to give the garden a more uniform look.

New succulent bed

I completed my succulent bed today. Of course I couldn't wait until the grass was dead and just put everything on top of it, starting on Friday already. I had to buy several bags of soil, sand, soil conditioner and pea gravel, which were multiple trips to Home Depot, because my car (Mustang convertible) only fits 3 bags at a time. My back suffered the most carrying all these heavy bags, especially the pea gravel, from the garage to the bed. Then yesterday it wouldn't stop raining and everything got pretty messy, but God thanks it stopped early in the morning today and I could go on planting.





this little pot in the middle is an Aloe vera, which I found yesterday when I was grocery shopping at Aldi for $3.95. It can't stay outside during winter, so I left it in the pot, also the 2 Pineapple plants are in a pot.I still want to plant some Hens & chicks to add more color and maybe buy 2 more bags of pea gravel for cleaner look. I had 2 bags, but they just disappeared in this bed like nothing. Actually I started liking the idea of having more succulents. And have already an other bed in mind, where I want to create a rock garden with Agave and Cacti. But that is still far away, because the next duty will be to remove all the Cannas and elephant ears from the corner bed, weed it, fill it up with soil and plant something more attractive there.