Yesterday we drove to Zetas garden centre and did some shopping. We bought some climbers that I planted next to the play house – common hop (Humulus, humle, humal) and honeysuckle (Lonicera periclymenum, vildkaprifol, väänduv kuslapuu). Ingrid picked another dahlia for the deck. And we got several bushes for the front garden – Japanese quince (Chaenomeles Japonica, rosenkvitten, ebaküdoonia), a dark-leaved variety of black elder (Sambucus nigra, fläder, must leeder) called “Black beauty”, staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina, rönnsumak, äädikapuu) and red-barked dogwood (Cornus alba, rysk kornell, kontpuu).

Today I spent much of the day digging. The part of the garden that I think of as the front garden, the quadrant between the house and the crossroads, has very heavy clay soil. When dry, it is hard as rock. After rain it’s just very dense and gluey. Luckily it’s been raining quite a lot recently – otherwise we’d probably have postponed the shopping for another weekend.

The front garden has been waiting for awhile. The previous owners weren’t particularly interested in gardening and left the entire garden very bare, pretty much just a lawn and a few large trees (which were all there before them).

After we moved here, it took about two years for us to get a feel for the garden and to settle on a plan for it. Last year we spent our time and money on the house. This year finally the garden gets some love.