Sundays at Grandma's - Nora’s Garden, Part 2

I sent an email out to my family and friends about working on Nora’s Garden on a Saturday in June.  I was anxious to get into the garden and start working.  The only plan I had was the idea for the yellow brick road.  The day before my family and friends were to come over, my husband and I went to the local landscaping store to pick up some stone.  My husband Bob, an ex-military man, wanted to know exactly how many bricks I needed.  He is a planning type of guy—a throw back to his military days.  I didn’t have a clue!  So I made up a number to satisfy him—I said 16 to 20 large ones and the same amount of smaller ones.

It was relatively easy to pick the type of stone I wanted for the yellow brick road.  I picked the one that was the closest color to yellow and also had several sizes.  Knowing that I wanted this to be a child’s garden, I told my husband that I would need 20 of the 8-inch squares, and 20 of the 3 x 6-inch bricks.  We also grabbed a few bags of sand to level the stones with.  I was excited about getting the garden done.

Then it rained.  Not only did it rain—it poured, and it was still wet and rainy the next morning when my family and friends were to come over to garden.  Not wanting everyone to be a muddy mess, I cancelled Nora’s Garden until the next day—Sunday.

Sunday night it rained again, but luckily, Sunday dawned sunny and bright with a light breeze, so we went for it.  Not all of my friends and family could help out—some had plans, but there were enough hands on board to make quick work of the garden.

The first step was to tidy up the existing plants, and remove a spirea that had been in existence for 24 years.  My brother-in-law Gary showed up and volunteered immediately to dig it out.  With the help of my brother Bob, it was planted into a different garden where it is doing quite well.  My sister Patti went to work trimming the existing lilac.  Doing those two things really opened up the space and the garden started to take shape.  BF Holly and my sister Candy filled in the hole from the shrub and leveled the dirt.  Yeah—it was time to put in the yellow brick road!

I outlined how I wanted the path to go and Holly evenly placed the bricks to form the broken heart.  I had guessed the perfect amount (or Holly just made it work).  My sister Sue arrived and then all of us girls got on our hands and knees and dug out around the stones, placed sand for leveling and put the stones in.  The yellow brick road was finally in place!  I could just imagine Nora skipping from stone to stone singing ‘We’re off to see the Wizard, the wonderful Wizard of Oz”!

The work in Nora’s Garden will continue next week.  Watch as it takes shape!

You can bury a lot of troubles digging in the dirt.

~Author Unknown