Yellow House Musings and More Fall Felicity

I

Yesterday and today I have been working full days in the yard at the Yellow House.  First of all, the trees in the yard there are on fire with color - I stop my labors often just to look at the brilliance of it - sometimes fall is so gorgeous I can hardly bear it.  I am dismantling/destroying what has been a delight to behold and hang out in for more than a decade; the area right outside the back of the house we always called the courtyard.  It is four brick lined quadrants jam packed with roses and perennials surrounding a center circle of lawn and little paths.  Now that I rent that house out, the work and maintenance on that property plus the one here where we now live is just too much.  And though my renters think it's all lovely, they don't really appreciate it and no one is enjoying it as it should be so I made the decision recently to rip out all the bricks and hundreds of plants and revert it to lawn.  That will make it more renter friendly and maybe even more desirable for a future buyer should I decide to sell.  Not everyone is crazy about flowers and roses and the upkeep.  I adore it all.  Yesterday I ripped out one quad and today I did another.  Tomorrow we are going up to the White Mountains to hike and then Thursday and Friday I should finish.

There is a 25' x 70' vegetable garden on the property as well, surrounded by a split rail fence and 50 antique and rugosa varieties of roses.  In late June and early July the sight of thousands and thousands of roses can take your breath away.  The vegetable beds inside this year were empty and forlorn and weedy.  The renters had no desire to grow vegetables.  I didn't even prune the roses this year because that is what I was doing there when I broke my ankle. Pruning! That whole area is being ripped out by me next March; fence, roses, everything, planted then with grass seed.  I dread that job enormously.  Some of the rambling roses growing along the fence have 20 foot long canes wrapped around the rails.  It's all sad but necessary.  

Sad, neglected, unpruned veggie garden - it's all going!

What I've torn out so far

Sure looks ugly minus the plantings

On the bright side, the fruit trees and berry patches will stay.  I'll be able to keep up with the work required and I did get to enjoy all that gorgeousness for years and I have been creating more of it here at the new house.  It's all good.

And the beautiful day in that neighborhood:

And close to home: