I've taken the front garden to task

I've gotten thoroughly fed up of the mess that the front garden has gotten into in recent times, a lot of this is due to the fact that I fell out of love with the house and felt vulnerable and threatened in my own garden due to the horrible neighbours living next door.  I know that I have mentioned her and her kids before now, well, they are still here, they haven't moved out, more's the pity.

Something had to give.  It either gets left in a mess and I put up with it or I muster up the physical and mental strength to tackle it and the neighbour.  I decided that I would tackle the garden and her if need be.  I had not got many plants left due to things they were doing to them, lack of care from me, the hot summer we've had and being choked out by what I thought was a creeping Sedum that turned out to be a similar looking weed.

I took advantage of the plants being thirsty to saturate the creeper in weed killer a couple of times over the school summer holidays to try and kill off the roots too, drink it up buddy!  Inspired by our recent visit to the Isle of Wight and seeing all the lovely plants at Godshill Model Village I had already planned the garden out in my head and set about ordering all the plants in, which were due for delivery Mid-September, which gave me a few weeks to get it into a condition where it can be replanted up.

The weed was pretty much killed off on the surface so I raked off the dead foliage, which allowed me to see what plants were actually left and I have to say, not many!  Before digging the garden over and getting any roots out I painted the fence blue and was entertained by some of the neighbours facial expressions as I did so.  I just carried on painting chuckling to myself.

The first photo shows the overgrown garden, the other photos show the garden raked off and the fence painted.  As always, our dog had to get in on the photos.

A few plants survived and some of these were moved to different positions whilst I can, such as all the lavender is now planted either side of the path by the door, the poppy has been moved forward, away from the fence, to allow for a larger shrub to be planted behind it so we can still see it once everything is grown.

These are images of the additional plants that have been planted in the garden.  A few shrubs, a few smaller plants and lots and lots of bulbs in a range of colours and styles.

I will have to take photos next year of it all in colour as it should look brilliants against the blue fence.