When I rented my house, I was so excited about the house itself and the farmyard, I didn't even realize the extent of the garden. It is HUGE! On first look there's a nice grass area surrounded by trees
But as I started exploring, this grassy area is just a small part of the overall garden and really the least interesting. Much of the garden though was impassable and unusable, because it looked like over the past few decades everything that had been cut down or trimmed off had just been thrown down wherever -- and whatever trash, wire or dishware someone had out there, they just left it.
This first year has been all about cleaning out the various areas of the garden. It's now about 97% done! I've taken out countless wheelbarrow loads of branches, ivy, brambles, tree trunks, trash -- a bit of everything. Fortunately I was able to dump it all in the old working farm area on the other side of the large barns.
Next year will be about making the garden pretty with benches, tables, chairs and outdoor statues.
Here's what I started with in the various areas of the garden and where things are now.
The Front Garden
This is the furthest area from the house next to the road. It was less piled up with cut branches but there were lots of old rotten fallen logs, branches and other rocks and pieces of wood hidden under a heavy blanket of ivy which made it hard to walk through. I couldn't tell what was even there until I started hauling stuff out.
(Just the other side of this is a pasture where cows occasionally graze. There are several large cow farms close by and they rotate the cows through a variety of pastures.)
Amazingly I found a rock wall and a beautiful area where I'll add some chairs and a bench in the spring.
Here's where it started
The Rock Garden
This two level area was so full of branches, brambles and rotten old tree trunks I didn't even realize there were gorgeous rocks and a rock wall until it was all cleared away.
The before
Here's the Rock Garden when it was about half way cleared
And where it is now
Angel Alley
This whole area was piled up in branches almost five feet deep. One end was (and still is) closed off with a beautiful large bush but the other end looked impassable.
I found the two angel statues laying in the garden. My landlord said they were given to them when his mom died. It's very windy here quite often but even though the two statues are just standing up, they have never blown over although much heavier things have at different times.
The Side Yard
This was the first area I cleared off. Trying to pull out all the old branches and stuff was like dismantling a 3D puzzle. Things were so intertwined I had to figure out what branches to pull out first. But slowly I was able to drag stuff out and take it away.
I swear I could hear the trees take a big breath as I pulled off ivy and cleared away all the dead, decayed stuff from around the trunks.
Here's where it is now.
The Grove
I didn't even realize this area existed for quite a while. And I'm still discovering additional parts stretching even farther back.
Here's at the beginning, the first big clear out and where it is now. There's still work to be done but it's going very well.
The Farmyard
One of the things I was really hoping to find when I was looking for a new home in Ireland was outbuildings. I think it's because of my foster grandparents farm. My mom went to live with them when she was 13 until she graduated high school. We would go and visit them until they died before I was ten.
They had a series of outbuildings that always fascinated me.
This is my farmyard with my three outbuildings, a one car garage and built-in stone raised flower beds. Could anything be more perfect than white stone and shiny black doors and trim.
I had to do a lot of work getting the flower beds cleaned out and ready for planting. Here's what some of them looked like at the beginning.
I had a few crops this first year. The most successful was my pumpkin plant.
This coming year I'm hoping to plant beautiful flower gardens in the raised beds. I have lots to learn though about what plants and how to best plant them.
I now have gates!
Until about a month ago there were no gates at my entrance from the road and I had several people just drive in. Which I did not like.
I discovered the old gates that hadn't been hung at the entrance for more than thirty years. One was in the garage and one in one of the out building. They were is fairly decent shape, but did need repair at one lower corner.
I asked around at one of my women's groups and found out the right guy to repair and rehang them lived right down the road from me.
In addition to repairing the rusted away area, the gates had to be made a bit narrower. Since they were removed, the pillars at the gate had either been replaced or resurfaced which made the entrance just narrow enough that the gates had to be adjusted.
We talked about having them sand blasted and repainted, but I was worried that with the age of the gates and some rust here and there, that sandblasting might cause them to fall apart. So after they were rehung, I went over them with a wire brush and painted them a shiny black oil based enamel.
It took almost four days for them to dry completely! I'll do another coat in the spring.
They look great now and it feels so much more secure that people can't just drive in when they want.
It's a little bit of a pain to open and close them every time I leave and return home, but it's totally worth it.
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