Views of the Cottage Patio

There are many spots in our house, and even in our outdoor spaces, where I can curl up with a good book.  My environment conspires against my productivity if productivity is measured by chores completed, tasks accomplished.  It is too easy to find oneself sitting down with a book, Kindle, magazine, newspaper--fill in the blank--and wile away more than a few minutes. 

I read while I ride the exercise bike early in the mornings, feeling quite virtuous about exercising, and experiencing no guilt about reading for pleasure before breakfast.  So far, so good.  However, when I exit my tiny exercise room, I am on the patio.  It is cool (relatively speaking, we are in Louisiana after all).  The fountains are merrily splashing, the wind chimes are tinkling softly, the Blue Jays are calling out noisily and the patio flowers are looking more lush and inviting as they become established.  The cats lounge around in companionable silence and various lethargic poses.

A table and a chair occupy center stage on the patio, inviting me to sit down with my coffee and continue reading until the sun hits the patio and the heat of the day begins in earnest.  Thus, the problem. . . . .




The fountain area of the patio is starting to look more lush.




The plants on the cottage patio make it attractive place to relax



Door to my workout/potting shed area




Shady bed beside the exercise room

...you might as well grab a cup of coffee, too, and join us for a few decadent minutes....

A walk on the wild side

Our side yard is in a state of great neglect, and since this is the view from my library desk, I constantly feel guilty that we haven't started to regain control of this area.  I think I'm still in mourning because the view from this window, until last year's drought, was a huge beautiful sasanqua, full of blooms in November, green leaves in the summer and interesting, flowing branches.  Well, it up and died one day. and Ricky cut it down.  Now instead of a shade garden, we have a dried patch of hard dirt.

The male holly next to the sasanqua location is sick--our neighbor's holly died a couple years ago.  Nothing they did could save it.  There's a female holly, plus a camellia, in our narrow side yard, and I worry about them, too.

The female holly appears healthy so far, and the red berries from this tree fill the view from an upstairs window as we walk down the steps at Christmas time.  The creatures like the berries, too, and I've been known to plop down on the steps and just sit, watching squirrels and birds enjoy the holly berries.  If there are still any left, once the Cedar Waxwings descent on our street, the tree is soon bare--and that's okay.

I've been sick this week and home from work several days, not feeling well enough to tackle the yard chores, but well enough to look and fret.  I ventured outside today to take some pictures of the neglect.  I'm going to post these for our "before" shots.  Maybe this will be motivating. 

The cats like the area now.

Rusty rabbit hangs on Ricky's horseshoe gate.

Found stuff display, including Katrina, the cat

 A boy (cat) named Daisy--neutered and sweet--sits on garden bench because
no one else would want to.

Daisy and friend, Stubby with congenital tail deformity (Stubby is spayed and feisty.)

The jungle--Turk's Cap--needs attention and irrigation

Every action has a reaction.  We took down the gutters on the house, because they stayed full of pine needles and were rotting the wood on the house.  We put a French drain on this side because the water was flowing under our house, undermining our beams and foundation.  The water no longer flows under our house, but it also doesn't flow over to the plants on the far side of drain, so now we have arid beds instead of the shade garden..  The shade is gone because of trees dying. 

We need to devote some serious time and attention to this area;  in the meantime, I'll just keep the shades down and read instead.