Homegrown Revolution in Edmonds

After taking out a couple dead and overgrown trees this spring, we have come up with a plan to replace our 500 square foot front yard with edible landscaping. Where there used to reside a rotting japanese maple and a dead-branched blue spruce, there will soon (or eventually) be a brick path, raised veggie beds, trellises, fruit trees, and berries. My old landscape plan skills from high school came back into play here, you can see (click on the photo to see it larger). The top of the page is north and the street. The dogwood and 4 large rhodies at the top are preexisting in a perennial bed area, as is the stump from the japanese maple ( I plan to grace it with a big pot of nasturiums!). The stone path on the right goes along our driveway up to the front door. After playing around with the path placement, after we took the trees down I watched the shadows during the day and realized the path to the side gate (and composting area) best be near the house to take full advantage of the sunny areas for veggies out of the house's shadow. Currently there are some stumps and roots in the center of the yard that will take some work to remove, so the bed placement in '09 is going to start on the far right where the yard is clear and flat for now.

For my birthday last week I received 2 fruit trees from Raintree Nursery, an awesome WA nursery, from my men. Yesterday they arrived and I got a surprise bonus! Instead of getting the promised 4-way cherry, mine is a FIVE way! Rainier, Lapin, Early Burlat, Kristin, and (surprise!) tart pie cherry Montmorency too! The second tree is an Italian Prune Plum and both trees look huge, healthy, and about to leaf out, so we better get diggin' this weekend! With my bday hardware store gift cards I bought compost, peat moss, and cedar 2 by 6's for veggie bed #1. I'm raring to go - just gotta shake this darn pneumonia!