Stimulating the Economy and More…

We certainly have done our best to help stimulate America’s economy!  It certainly needs everyone’s help and that’s a fact… Covid-19/coronavirus has laid waste to what was a booming growth period in our history. 

Well, we started out the year helping out the local economy with the dental profession…and some ‘fun’ oral surgery.  Then we had a new roof installed.  That was followed by brand new gutters and, along the way, our heating, ventilation and air conditioning service picked up some added and unplanned income as well. 

But we weren’t done! 

It all started when our neighbors built their new house on the garage side of our home…  Without consulting them, the builder leveled all the trees on their lot.  That side of our house was along the edge of the woods and most of it was moss covered.  It was like having a green carpet year around. 

As you can see from the photos, the moss is gone and erosion had badly impacted this section of our rear side yard.  Not only was it ugly, but the new pattern of rain runoff was washing out any mulch and had created a ‘no-grow’ zone.

So…one day just a couple of weeks ago, this pick-up truck backed down our driveway and began unloading stones, rocks and small boulders of various sizes.  Bag after bag of mulch followed.  Then came some flat stepping stones… Several trips were needed to get all of the materials.

These photos show what work was done to 1) create an area for Laurie’s new plantings, 2) stop the erosion, 3) improve the appearance of our yard, and 4) create a stepping stone walk way toward our back yard.  

The stepping stones still need to be spaced properly and set into the soil so they are stable.  In addition, we need to plant grass between the stones once they are permanently in place.  We did have to have our sprinkler system service pay us a visit to change out a sprinkler head in order to allow us to water this area when the hot and dryer weather is upon us…

We’ve had 2 or 3 heavy rains since this work was done and it appears that the drainage/wash out problem has been properly addressed.  The staggered half-moon stone ‘dams’ by each of the plantings were the key to success.    

When we had a service clean off the old gutters last year, one of their ladders broke off part of this Japanese Maple Tree and damaged a significant limb.  Necessity is the mother of invention.  We just used some painters tape to bind the damaged branch together, hoping to save it.  As you can see by the second photo, when we took the tape off a week or so ago, you can still see where the damage was but since there is growth beyond the damage, the tape must have done the job…

I’m using the first photo…which was taken when the roof was being installed…to show just how dark and dirty our driveway was.  It sat under a number of hickory trees and having it cleaned was basically a waste of time.  

Now, with almost all of the trees gone, I decided it would be worth-while to have it scrubbed.  The company that did the rock work also cleaned the driveway for us…

Now for a look around the yard at some recent flowering scrubs and blooms.  Just lately, we learned that this is a flowering wild privet.  Since the flowers looked great and smelled so nice…from anywhere in the yard…we’d assumed that they were honeysuckle bushes.

A privet is a flowering plant that contains about 50 species of both deciduous and evergreen shrubs.  They sometimes form small or medium-sized trees.  The leaves or bark of Chinese privets are used in herbal medicine to treat diarrhea, stomach ulcers, bowel problems, chapped lips, sore mouths and throats and as a wash for skin problems.  The leaves and bark also make a useful tea for improving appetite and digestion for chemotherapy patients.  On the negative side, some species are considered an invasive species here in North America.

Laurie’s front flower bed is a riot of color this spring.  Right now there is a mix of pansies interwoven with pretty little red drift roses and the bright yellow Stella de Oro re-blooming day-lilies.  A little later on, her purple cone flowers will bloom.  Both the Stella de Oro day-lilies and the cone flowers are favorites for the butterflies.  In addition to blooming and then re-blooming, the day-lilies are also deer resistant.

That’s about all for now… Just click on any of the photos to enlarge them.

Thanks for stopping by for a visit!

Stay Safe and Take Care, Big Daddy Dave