Posts Tagged ‘gazebo’
Wider View
It occurred to me, after the fact, that yesterday’s post would have been well-served by a photo of the entire gazebo. I hadn’t taken such a picture when I was capturing the flower blossoms earlier so I stopped down there yesterday to remedy that.
Pause and enjoy the image for a moment. Place yourself there, virtually. Hear the quiet that is gently visited by occasional bird songs.
It’s a sound that I appreciate a little more than normal lately. I’ve been staying up well past my usual bedtime this week because I’ve become an unlikely viewer of a national political convention. The residual echoing of high energy motivational speaking happening one after another has me appreciating the soothing quiet of our natural sanctuary spaces anew.
Watching a political convention is something I can honestly say I’ve never done before in my life. I tell myself the reason I find this litany of endless partisan cheerleading so captivating is that it offers a soothing antidote to the years of stinking dreck coming from a weird doofus who lies for a living.
However, the real truth about why I would now choose to watch this convention might more accurately be that I’m just getting old.
It doesn’t hurt that Kamala Harris selected the Governor of my home state of Minnesota to run as her VP. I’m a big fan.
I sure hope their effort succeeds. If there was ever a time for logic to manifest in the universe, let it happen for this November’s US presidential election.
Just one more night of convention speeches. I’m looking forward to a return to my old person’s sleep schedule starting tomorrow.
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Trumpet Vine
It appears we have succeeded in transplanting a vine to the gazebo beside the labyrinth. That metal frame used to have a canvas cover that provided shelter from sun or rain but it succumbed to the elements a few years ago. We decided to try crafting a natural roof, starting with weaving long sticks through the frame and then filling spaces by threading in old grape vines.
We have since transplanted multiple versions of vines in hopes they will climb the frame and take up residency in and around the sticks and old vinewood. The trumpet vine is showing the most vigor and recently began bursting forth with blossoms.
I suspect it may take a year or two more to fully cover that gazebo but we are in it for the long game. Heck, we’ve got a maple tree in the center of the labyrinth that I dream will command dominance over the space in a hundred years.
We can wait a little while for the gazebo to gain its full green crown. At least that can happen while I’m still alive. The maple tree… I’ll just have to imagine what that will look like when is has soared to its maximum height and largest diameter trunk.
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Final Opportunity
Yesterday was our last chance to tackle any projects jointly –no pun intended– because today is Cyndie’s right knee replacement surgery. This will make it three artificial joints: left knee, right hip, and now right knee. I’m not counting the rebuilt right shoulder, but easily could in the chronicle of significant surgeries of the last ten years for Cyndie.
I blame her Lyme Disease history.
For all the things I can get persnickety about, cleaning tools after every use tends to evade me. This is how the shovels looked when I pulled them out for yesterday’s transplanting adventures:
Good enough for me. I scraped some of the mud off before putting them away last time. At least I put them away back where we could find them again. Putting tools away after use is another habit I wish I was more consistent about practicing.
In our final hurrah at getting things done before Cyndie is put out of action for a while, we started with digging up and transplanting more of our ornamental tall grasses. I’m a tad concerned it was too easy and might end in limited success in the survival of the relocated sections. Regardless, it will be great just to have the old batch pruned down to a more reasonable size.
If we get any sprouts of tall grasses in the variety of new locations it will be a wonderful bonus.
While we were doing some of the new plantings just across the driveway, we became aware of a significant number of wild grapevines entangling the trees there. Unraveling one piece kept leading to another and soon we were on our way to the next project, completely unplanned.
I am always amazed to discover significant vine growth that was happening right before our eyes which we failed to notice despite our ongoing quest to give our trees priority over vines.
After pulling up as many as we could, we headed down to the labyrinth where we are trying to get vines to grow on the gazebo as a replacement to the old canvas that once provided overhead cover from sun and rain.
It is interesting trying to encourage something to grow only where you want after having just violently pulled it out of the ground in a location where it seemed perfectly happy to be.
After tending to the horses together, we moved on to our landscape pond where we removed the winter cover.
Any other outdoor projects Cyndie would normally be tackling this time of year are on hold for a while now. I will be splitting my time between doing what I can outside and being Cyndie’s primary care nurse and full-time driver.
We are sending love to the doctors and nurses in advance and visualizing a flawless procedure that is free of complications. Feel free to join us is conjuring good vibes for today.
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Survey Results
We walked around in search of trillium yesterday and found mixed results. I think in my next transplant effort I will keep them closer to each other upon replant. Here is a view of three I planted:
No flowers, but the two at the top each have new sets of three leaves appearing beneath them. Is this the expansion underway that I seek? Better than finding none at all. In other locations, we struggled to find all three points of a triangle where I would have planted them. Sometimes two, sometimes only one.
At the same time, we did find several isolated trilliums with flowers located in places where neither of us remembers having transplanted any.
New growth on the ground in the forest is rather sparse this spring, maybe in a reflection of the uncharacteristic dry conditions we are experiencing.
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The photo on the left above is an example of new shoots appearing beneath the one with the flower, which excites us with hope that more could result in the future. The image on the right is an example of a lone trillium with little else of any variety seeming to flourish much.
It just might be a slim year of growth. Yesterday’s passing clouds never spit enough sprinkles out to simply wet the ground surface. We are forced to try to do some watering outselves.
I turned on the water to the labyrinth and we transplanted one more vine from where it was trying to strangle a tree to one of the legs of the gazebo. This will be the first year of an attempt to grow a canopy of leaves as the cover of the gazebo instead of the old canvas that was getting threadbare.
Nothing like trying to inspire new growth during a time of drought.
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Adding Lattice
On a gift of a day in late November when warmth and sunshine belied the proximity to winter and scores of others were hanging Christmas lights on their homes, Cyndie and I were weaving branches into the frame of our gazebo.
The inspiration struck a few weeks ago when I was pulling down the aging canvas canopy in preparation for the onset of winter. The old cover had long ago faded from the original brown color to a silvery-blue and the fabric fibers, weakened by the relentless bombardment of solar rays, were breaking around the edges.
I was pretty sure it didn’t have another summer of life left, so I considered alternatives. A natural canopy of live vines would provide shade in summer and leaves would fall off for the winter so I wouldn’t need to do any additional work.
All I needed to do was convince Cyndie the idea had merit. Since we share a similar perspective about these kinds of things, she was all in.
While I was taking a few weeks to think through how I might execute my vision, Cyndie was thinning our woods of saplings in preparation.
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First, we wove one long stick along the front face, then, two. Continuing around the four sides, we worked our way up. The closer we got to the top, the harder it was to weave the branches through, so we switched to cuttings from wild grapevines.
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Next spring, we will transplant some wild vines from our woods to the four legs of the gazebo in hopes of establishing a natural canopy that thrives on the massive exposure of direct sunlight.
My only trepidation is about how much snow might collect throughout winter to stress the modest strength of the metal framework. I expect it will depend on how wet or dry the snowfalls are and how frequently separate snow events will occur.
It’s a gamble we are willing to wage. I figure, worst case, I could use more cut trees from our woods to prop up the frame in places where the metal shows signs of buckling. The whole thing is already flexed out of level due to the lack of solid footings. We merely set the four legs on spots I prepared when we moved the gazebo to this spot beside the labyrinth. The ground in those spots has not shifted in unison from the subsequent seasons of freeze/thaw cycles.
The structure has a quaint “askew” look that I expect will fit nicely with the vision I have for a natural canopy of living green growth by the middle of summer.
For now, we just watch and wait.
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Final Touches
With the big job of moving the gazebo done, thanks to our kids’ help, Cyndie and I made some final tweaks yesterday to complete the new setup. As so often occurs, a plan with one thing in mind expands to several others that need to happen first, to reach the ultimate goal.
Our main objectives were to level the base beneath the bench seat and move the hydrangea tree by transplanting it to a different spot around the labyrinth. We quickly agreed that the place where we put a gracefully rotating section of a tree trunk to stand as a visual attraction would be ideal for the hydrangea.
That old trunk was starting to disintegrate anyway, under the combined pressure of many woodpeckers and natural decay. When we struggled to pick it up, we discovered it hadn’t lost as much mass as appearance led us to suspect, but it looked beat up enough that we didn’t feel bad booting it from its prominent spot.
In the image above, you can see the trunk is now farther out on the left. The hydrangea tree is front and center, garnished with a fresh mulch of wood chips I made on Friday.
Before we transplanted the tree, we wanted to have water available, so I needed to get a hose and turn on the spigot up at the house. That required that the four-way splitter that was removed from the spigot last fall needed to be found. I’m sure we thought we were being obvious when we stowed it away eight months ago.
I was proud of myself when I remembered to grab a level for the bench at the same time I was retrieving a hose from the shop garage. Unfortunately, I needed to send Cyndie back up to find the hose splitter for the spigot.
While she was gone, I trimmed the golden weigela bushes that were on either side of the bench, and now being crowded by the gazebo.
Relocating the hydrangea tree was the most rewarding, as that completely opened up the primary access to the gazebo and bench, which also just happens to serve as an archway entrance to one of our trails into the woods.
It looks odd to no longer see the gazebo in its old spot above the round pen, but we are very happy with the new location beside the labyrinth where it is bound to get much more use.
In addition, this opens up the old spot to easier cutting and raking for hay. We have connected with neighbors who were thrilled with the opportunity to cut and bale our fields for their growing herd of llamas. For a while there, we were a little worried that all the effort we had put into improving our fields would be lost if the weeds were given a chance to return unchallenged.
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Final Season
The horses are gone, but their manure is not. We have entered the final season of composting horse manure, with an extra large inventory of winter piles to be processed, both in the paddock and the compost area.
The advantage I have this time is that there won’t be a new daily supply forcing me to constantly arrange for open space. That takes away a lot of pressure.
I will turn these piles when convenient, but won’t fret about getting it done in the shortest time possible.
Sadly, that burden has left the barn.
It’s bittersweet. I’m thrilled over the release from daily manure duties, but I miss the energy of living with horses.
This afternoon, a neighbor is planning to stop by to purchase some of our leftover bales of hay. It is one small step in the slow transition of the very large project of getting rid of all the trappings related to keeping horses.
We need to have an “Everything Must Go!” sale. Ropes, buckets, blankets, saddles, fly masks, halters, and brushes.
Cyndie has itemized and priced everything that isn’t nailed down. The panels that form our round pen are one of the highest priced items. I wouldn’t be surprised if she tried to sell the sand we brought in for that circle where her teaching took place.
We talked about moving the gazebo over near the labyrinth. Seemed like a logical idea to me at the time, but thinking about it yesterday, I realized it would probably require disassembly to achieve. That’s a lot of hardware to futz with.
I wonder how long I can put off that effort.
I’m pretty sure I will be too busy turning compost piles.
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Sand Play
We had fun in our giant sand box yesterday. The round pen has not had consistent attention this summer which has given the grass a chance to become a little too prominent a feature. The horses get confused over whether they are supposed to be exercising or eating.
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The Grizzly and our snazzy ABI grader do a good job of converting the appearance from a look of neglect to one of groomed and ready to go.
Separating the uprooted grass bundles from the sand takes a little more manual effort. It’s the kind of activity that draws the attention of the chickens, who assume we must be scratching for insects they can eat. Cyndie tried to explain to them that the roots were not worms, but they just stared at her like a bunch of chickens, don’t you know.
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The gazebo is ready. The round pen is ready. We might as well hold some workshops, eh?
Might as well.
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Watched, Learned
Last month there was construction on the parking lot at the day-job and I found myself transfixed by the quick and efficient bucket work of a loader. Over and over I watched how the driver scooped up loads from a pile of asphalt debris in a smooth motion.
Last weekend I was able to practice copying what I had seen. I used our diesel tractor to move lime screenings from the pile dumped beside the hay shed, into the paddock to fill rills and washouts on the slopes beneath the overhang.
I was pleasantly surprised by how quickly I succeeded in improving my technique.
The last time I tried this exercise, I had a hard time keeping the bucket from digging into the turf and dirt beneath the pile, and I had trouble with spinning my rear tires and scarring the ground beneath the wheels with deep divots.
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Striving to emulate what I had seen weeks earlier, I focused on lifting the bucket through the pile in a single fluid motion, not worrying about trying to get the absolute most material in every scoop. I also practiced sliding the bucket into the pile from a few inches above the base, instead of right at the ground level.
It was easy to come back later and use a hand shovel to reshape the pile and scrape screenings away, down to the grass level.
My improved technique resulted in a lot less fuss for me and a lot less muss to the grounds.
Spring-boarding from that success, I took the tractor out again on Wednesday after work to mow the waterway and fence line along our property border to the south. With a dash of lucky good fortune, I executed maneuvers with minimal hassle to complete the mowing in extremely tight space limitations.
That worked so well, I was done with plenty of time to spare and continued positive momentum that led me to steer my attention to the leaning frame of the gazebo.
It is time to put the shade tarp over the frame, so I figured it best to first look into addressing the two bent top frame members. Ad-libbing a plan, I started taking out bolts to remove one section of bent frame. After multiple trips walking back to the shop for needed tools, I got the piece separated.
That led to another trip to the shop to see if I could figure out a way to bend the square tube back to straight and press out the kinks. My luck held and the first try brought success, just as time was running out for the day.
With my concerns about fixing the top tubes assuaged, I decided it would be most prudent to address the settling that has occurred at the base of the four vertical supports, in order to take away that additional play which allowed the structure to lean in the first place.
It just so happens I have a surplus of pavers that should work very nice in creating a new level footing under each of the four legs of the structure.
That’s one of the main projects on my plan for today. That, and wielding my new loader skills to move a large amount of old compost to make room for new.
There’s nothing like putting new skills to good use.
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Getting Trim
We made visible progress on the grounds yesterday by finally cutting the middle section of pasture that hadn’t been mowed all summer.
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We haven’t even installed the tarp cover of the gazebo next to the round pen yet, which reveals the lack of workshop activity in the early season of 2017.
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That is changing now. We are cranking up preparations for a shot at accomplishing a summer’s worth of workshops in the final month. The horses have been patiently waiting. I think they are getting excited seeing the increase in maintenance of the grounds.
They can tell it’s soon time to do what they do best.
Now all we need is people interested in discovering what the horses have to offer.
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Relative Something 