We have a lawn

WELL, we kind of have a lawn. It's not huge; about 7'x16'. But, it was FREE!!! A person posted it up on craigslist-- he had purchased too much for his yard and wanted to give it away before it got yellow.

It was a crazy day on Friday. I had already agreed to go get some other free plants when the grass ad popped up. I ran outside after work and hopped on my bike, only to find a flat tire. DRAT! A coworker dropped me off at home (after having to stop for a train), and on my way out, another train detained me. DRAT! I put as much sod in my car as I could without risking to blow the suspension on my car. Turns out I got about 7'x16'. I unloaded it, soaked the rolls, and then ran out to get some lawn dirt to make the sod happy. Raced home, spread out the dirt, watered the dirt, then rolled out the grass and watered it. And the results:

Yes, we have a lawn. We want to eventually extend it to the deck stairs (about $30 worth of grass), and this project definitely helped save some money on the entire endeavor. It's about $40 worth of grass that we got for free.

I then raced over to another person's (gorgeous, amazing) house and yard. They were redoing part of their garden, and they had a circle of older boxwoods. The trunks are about 2.5-3" thick! There were 17 of them, and they were mine... if I dug them up.

I broke two shovels. Luckily, the first shovel was a cheap shovel, and it had already given us more than it's value in usage. I bought a replacement shovel, being careful to get a shovel with a warranty. Good thing, because I snapped that shovel too and had to return it... ONE HOUR LATER. Returned it very sheepishly. New shovel in hand, I dug up all the boxwoods.

They are gorgeous, amazing plants. I made two planter boxes immediately and painted them. One had dry enough paint for me to plant 3 boxwoods in it on Saturday (photo further down). But the other 14 needed a home, so I I decided to smush them all into a half-empty raised bed. Being put together and roots shaded, I hope to have enough time to build some more, cute, individual boxes and paint them without the boxwoods being painfully unhappy. And here they are, getting soaked:
And here is the planter of three that has been completed. These are English boxwoods, so they will grow tall if I let them. I put this box here so they could grow tall and block the pergola's view of the compost pile. :) The white on the boxes will eventually be the same white paint used on the patio set.

All the digging and freebies made for a bit of a changed weekend than I had anticipated. I didn't weed the tomato area, I didn't cover the basil or finish planting my lettuce. I didn't start my squash or beans. But, on Sunday, we had a barbecue for some friends, and we played a RIDICULOUS game of croquet on the teeny lawn. Fabulous!

Yesterday, I played catch-up. I weeded 90% of the soon-to-be tomato area. I planted my buttercrunch lettuce and arugula. I covered the basil bed and the cauliflower/mesclun mix/buttercrunch/arugula bed with plastic sheeting to encourage warmth and growth. I snipped holes in the netting on my potatoes so they wouldn't be stuck against the netting as they continue their explosive growth. All in all, a busy day.

I have also discovered that my handy garden gloves have dirt in the fingers. This explains why my nails are always dirty even after I wear gloves. I kept my nails short for a while, but I became sick of having to hide my ratty-looking garden hands at work. My nail file is my new best friend. :)

Today, I hope to get some cedar lumber. I want to make and semi-fill my first garden bed for the tomato area, as well as build and paint the individual beds for the rest of the boxwoods. This will all be post-work. Hmmm...Ambitious, yes, but impossible? Naw.