Take a walk on the wide side

I'm on time for Heather at Xericstyle's Wide Shot this month (note to self: Once! Don't let it go to your head!).  In getting these shots I experienced a series of little shocks.  Not any the earth moved, change my outlook on life stuff, but I did garner insight on the way I view my garden spaces, which to my mind explains a lot about how they've ended up looking.  More on that in a moment.

First up?  To ease the nerves I feel at exposing myself so mercilessly with these wide shots I'm going to start out with two cheater close-ups of a couple of recent victories here.

I've transplanted this little sumac tree twice now.  The first time I moved it out from under a large yaupon and stuck it into one of my favorite blue pots as part of the triad design rules (1 thriller, 1 filler, 1 spiller).  The sumac was my thriller, and thrilled I was when it took to its new home.  The second transplant came when I rather rudely yanked it, root bound, back out of the pot.  I planted it out front and was thrilled a second time to see it survived the winter.  If I can keep the deer from browsing it to pieces, (the reason for the ugly mini-fencing) I think this will be its forever happy place.

Also?  I have several irises I brought with me when we moved back "home" to Austin.  They have been shifted around our lot multiple times over the years, always in search of the right spot, each transplant restarting the "two years in place before I'll bloom" clock.

I've been envious of the iris shots on everybody else's blogs lately so I hope you'll pardon me for intruding on the wide shot meme space just long enough to do this.  Ta da!  Iris!! (I do jazz hands when I read that aloud - you feel free to join me or sit silently shaking your head.  Your call.)

OK - back to bidness.  The wide shots.

A followup shot of the curb beds up the hill from the drive.  Bluebonnets are setting seed and the damianita is taking center stage.  Lavender is blooming but you have to lean over to see it.

The view out front all the way down the hill.  Except for right around the mailbox and up in the walled beds this used to be a swath of St. Augustine.  No matter what I've got going here now or how it looks, I count it as a total victory that there is no more lawn.  No. More. Lawn!

Wide shot of the back bed, flat footed.  Meyer lemon trees in the white pots on either side of the bench releafed to our relief, as they were damaged by the cold despite our wrappings.  Fingers crossed they'll set fruit again.

And now the aerial view - an overhead of that same back bed.  Bluebonnets here are setting seed, the primroses as well though they still have blooms. Daisies are up, joined by our first yellow coneflowers.  Four-o-clocks are re-emerging, as are garlic chives and jewels of Opar.

Looking the other direction, a first glimpse of the Hub's recently re-established plethora of potted plumeria.  This has become an annual project for him and though I don't love the early views, the flowers to come will well reward the wait.

Finally, just for grins, a shot looking up the path I almost always regard from the opposite direction.  Reaching up above the blooms please note the bottle tree in the background juxtaposed with a staked bottle brush tree in the foreground.  This is my first attempt at a garden pun and it never fails to bring a smile to my face.

Which brings me back to the insight I gained after forcing myself to go wide with the views this month.  I very rarely look at my garden spaces in toto. The labor of maintaining a garden can be daunting, especially when factoring in a limit to my outdoor access.

Rather than allow myself to be overwhelmed, I've developed the habit of focusing on one small pocket of space at a time, broken away from all the others.  It results in a "to-do" list that is, well, "doable".  The danger enters when I employ every glance at the garden spaces solely to assess work to be done.  In my case, what begins as coping mechanism can easily morph into a character flaw.  I now must consciously refuse to allow the beauty in these beds to be reduced, in my viewing, to a job site.

So a sincere "thank you Heather!" goes out for hosting the wide-shot meme.  It allowed me a broader look at not only my garden spaces, but also at how I approach them.  I resolve here and now to (try! try to!) spend at least as much time lost in admiration of the "work" that goes on in nature without my intervention as I spend time lost in planning what comes next.  This next month I'll attempt something new to me - gardening as both a journey and a destination.