GardenGal, you ask me how long we have been doing our landscaping, and I forgot to answer your question. Sorry. We built and moved in August 2005 after retiring in May 2005. Started the build in March of that year, wanting it be ready for us in the first of June, but the builder did not start when we thought he would...so it drug on for nine weeks before we could move in. First thing I did was to plant an orchard and start my flower beds. The perennial bed was started about three or four years ago; the clematis on the East side about six/seven years ago held up by landscape timber and wire panel. DH built the support for the Wisteria about that time, too,
bull strong, to hold up the weight of the plants. The jelly I make every year comes from our orchard. Dh got the tires free and began building up the garden every since then, with some changes every year. I have been planting along the YY state highway since we moved in, and the lilacs are now well established and roses too..as well as along the house. Most of our roses came from
www.heirloomroses.com 'cause the University of Iowa professor developed a hardy rose and they marketed them. He would throw them into Iowa corn fields to winter, and what survived, he would develop them future. Dh has from our front door to the East end of the house, and I have from the door to the West end where the garage is attached to the house.
Today, the rest of the old house, brick piers, are getting buried...it has bugged my dh all this time. They did bury most of the old house that was here, and cleared the land of twenty five years of growth. We did want to save some of it, but too much poison oak, so we just started fresh with about eight to ten trees on the lot..2.9 acre lot.