See you are my SUNSHINE!! Check out that back yard!! WOW That will keep you busy. It is just beautiful. You made my day again. I am making chicken Chili. We are having a Nor Easter here in New England. They say sun will shine on Thursday. I just come to your BLOG and the sun is always shinning. Thanks so much. imaluckydog

It's absolutely beautiful!

BG, Wow! Thats how I imagined your yard, garden area would look, so very different here in southern Calif. We are lucky to have a chunk of grass we call our back yard. Our yards are ity-bity , I think the lots on our block are only 5,000 sq. ft. most of it is all house. Thanks for sharing the photos.

Barbara

Just beautemous! I would love to have flowers in my yard, but there is a lot of shade and can't seem to keep much alive in the heat and shade here. I also would like to have a herb garden, even if was only container size, but again, the green thumb does not live here! Looks lovely! Good job.

Thanks girls...anyone need some herbs LOL? Even in our first apartment I grew herbs in the sunny windowsill...they're easy.

your little slice of heaven indeed. how beautiful. i would love some herbs, but i've heard they don't ship well. lol i should try to grow some if they're easy. i have a black thumb though. worth a shot i guess. we'll see. can you grow then year round?

What a lovely place to relax, or entertain or anything!!! What is that weird dude called in the pot at one of the corners of the gazebo? It looks like a prehistoric cross between a palm tree and a cactus!! I need one!

xavier- OMG...too funny you picking that plant!!! DH likes to buy those tiny cactus that you get at the local harware stores, you know, in a tiny 2" pot. We've only lived here 9 years, and I'm not sure when he bought them but not immediately. The one by the gazebo corner you pointed out is now 5' above the soil, but if you look closely across the gazebo to the far side there's a green pot with another one in it (looks like a post) and it's 6' above the soil now (you can't see the leaves because they're above the gazebo). They're called a Madagascar Palm (but it's not really a palm, it's from the cactus family of Pachypodium so they're sometimes called that). Of course we have to bring them in here in the winter (which is a big production since we have 2 steps down to the patio...someone always gets stabbed). I'm laughing because I call the big one 'DH's phallic symbol' it's a single stem and in the winter here they go dormant and slowly lose their leaves (the giant one is just an ugly gray stem in the winter)...every year I think I've killed it and every year that damn phallic symbol grows back (DH thinks it's hysterical...he always let's me know when the baby leaves are starting to show again). Well I've only got 9' ceilings on the first floor so sooner or later it's not going to be able to winter over inside LOL! Oh, and in the pic the leaves are just about 1/2 way out so they'll get twice as big/long as you see here. He's got several other varieties cactus/palm ones out there you can't see. DD just bought him a 4" 'bunny ear cactus' for Father's Day (looks like a whole bunch of Mickey Mouse heads)...wonder how big that will be in a few years!

diva-I don't grow the herbs year round inside, but my Mom does bring some of her annual ones in to winter over (Bay, Rosemary), but they go into 'dormant' mode here over the winter even in a window and don't do real well (not the same kind of sun to keep them healthy looking so I choose to buy the annuals again each year). Three sections of the herb garden are all perennials (and a few annual herbs in pots) so they come back every year and the section that looks bare is where I put the annuals (basil, dill, sage, parsley, rosemary, bay...but even some of these stay year round in hotter climates so it depends on where you live...ie. rosemary can become a huge bush in the far south). We're only a 'Zone 5' on the planting scale here in Pittsburgh. Most herbs like hot sun, well drained soil and not too much water.