February 7, 2011

things are looking up

Not a lot going on, but on the positive side of things I have had quite a bit of response to my items I'm selling online.  Several bids and lots of interest on all eight items so that's great.  Of course we all know that they are not gone  - till they are paid for and gone - but I'm liking the look of things at the moment. 

I may well list a few more things while I'm enjoying the buzz of it all.  So that's what I'll be doing today, taking photos and uploading.  If some of these bigger items sell - I'll be doing the happy dance. 

So not much to show in the way of actual declutter so I thought I would include some snaps taken this weekend of our yard.  We're on a small acreage (5) and although when I look at these photos it all looks very tropical, it is not in the Tropics!  Please note - I'm not a technical person, don't know the botanical names for many things and I don't take snazzy photos.  My apologies.





 

Our soil here is very average, tending to clay with only average topsoil.  We have been here 20 years this October (I feel so old when I say that) and probably the first 10 years were spent trying to improve the soil. 

We had truckloads (yes I repeat, truckloads) of chook manure delivered here (luckily the neighbours aren't too close).  Also truckloads of mulch delivered here over that time and various other organic means of improving the soil. 

We planted lots of trees and have designated areas for different groupings - shade  trees, citrus, rainforest and understorey plants.  The yard is definitely 'low maintenace'  -there are easy mowing tracks throughout.

We have only 'developed' half of the 5 acres.  The other half is re-vegetated back to bush, or similar to what was here originally.  We get a lot of wildlife here as suburbia moves closer in. 

For a few years we had organic ceritification as we toyed with the idea of producing market crops.  In the end we have only produced food for ourselves and that is what we are happy with for the foreseeable future.  However, organic gardening has always been the only way for us.

One day when I declutter enough, I will find some early photos of the yard as it was - an overgrazed dirt bowl with a few trees!  It's great to look back on the early photos isn't it?  Just to look back and compare and see how far you've come. 

Anyways - I guess this is the outcome.  An almost tropical looking front yard not in the tropics.

And the reason most of these photos were taken looking up??  The sight looking down is pretty bad at the moment.  Our ride on mower has broken and wating on parts.  In the meantime we are keeping up (not really) with the hand mower (petrol not push) but I think you can even hear the grass growing as we speak. 
 
cheers Wendy

3 comments:

dreamer said...

Gorgeous garden, from where I'm looking it is very tropical :) Cold , wet and windy here in Scotland.Fingers crossed for some good sales for you :)

Nelly said...

Oh how lucky you are my dream forever is to own acres at the moment I am stuck in suburbia and I hate it.Your garden looks wonderful

duchess_declutter said...

dreamer - a bit cooler here today. About 23 deg.C. The last few days have been about 31 - 32 with very high humidity. yuk. Thanks for the comments on our garden. Sometimes I think you need to take photos to appreciate things.

Nelly - thanks - yes garden is nice to have but sometimes (like now) a smaller yard sounds appealing too.