swingchickie | yard work is HARD.

2 hours outside digging in the backyard, and i am sunburnt and my back is complaining loudly. the good news is that at least the back flowerbed against my house is on its way to looking nice. i should have taken a "before" picture to show just how awful it was, just a mess of giant weeds and old, dry mulch that went halfway across the back of my house and downhill around the corner. now most of the weeds are gone (i had to give up before my back went completely nuts), most of the ground is turned over and ready for me to start planting some seeds. and jack dug up some hostas from his house and drove them over to plant around the back corner that goes uphill, and they look awesome. so in another week or so, after a couple more evenings playing in the dirt, it'll actually look like a garden and not just a neglected wasteland.

i wish i was more knowledgeable about garden design. i've read some magazines on it, but am clueless as far as actually deciding what i should plant and where it should go. i'm that way with most aesthetic stuff -- i know if i love or hate something, i can point to an outfit or a home interior and say "that is fabulous"... but if you gave me a sketch pad or a blank canvas and asked me to actually create something from scratch, all you'd get from me is a big "duh". so we'll see how all this stuff looks later in the summer once it's all in bloom; i may be digging up flowers and figuring out where else to put them. :)

for now, off to pop some advil. i don't even want to think about what my back will feel like tomorrow.