I didn’t post the before pic because I didn’t take one. If I had, it would’ve showed grass and weeds partially obscuring the lovely rocks I hauled a few at a time down from the Group Home to line the front “garden”. It was scraggly as all getout.

I didn’t take a before pic because this was a prodject that kind of evolved. While the GG was building some new steps in the back yard, I put on my hat and sunglasses and headed out into the front yard with my pick-up-stick tools: rake, old recycle tub, garden glubs, and kneeling pad (a must if you are bare-kneed). My method? I rake up a bunch of sticks (and leaves and acorns and whatever other debris is out there), then I kneel on my pad and gather up all the stuff and dump it into the recycle tub (we don’t use tubs for recycling any more). When my tub gets full, I dump it into one of the big Recycle Ann Arbor compost carts. Lather, rinse, repeat. I am a terrible gardener but I am pretty good at cleaning things up.

Hmmm… The GG planted a bunch of fancy tulip bulbs last fall and they look gorgeous. At least those that have produced flowers this year do, there are some other ones (see the gap?) that are growing but no flowers. But there was all this scraggly grass and weedy stuff… That I didn’t take a pitcher of. Because I moved my tools over there and just dived in. I pulled every one of those rocks out of its spot, weeded all of the crap out from around it and put it back. (Note that I did not work anywhere NEAR as hard as the GG with his 70-pound blocks.)

Better? Yes. Curb appeal. Not so fast, KW. What about those scraggly bushes up there closer to the house? I hate those bushes. I want to get rid of them. But. They provide bird habitat. We have *birds* here. I remember The Commander staying here one April back in the Jurassic Age and saying in wonder, “It’s like being in an aviary.” Yes, it is. Well except for the woodpecker but that’s a whole ‘nother story. But birds use those bushes throughout the year, even in the deepest, darkest depths of Mordor aka our Great Lake State Polar Vortex Winter.

So, how do we rip out the ugly bushes without displacing some of our bird population? The GG is thinking of putting new bushes in front of the old (I am okay with having some bushes out there, just not the ones we have now) and then removing the old. Not sure what we’ll do but I am cautiously optimistic about that plan…

Oh yeah. Curb appeal? We are NOT selling this house. It may not be the biggest, fanciest house on earth but it is not bad and there is a woods behind it and I can walk to the grokkery store and Westgate and Knight’s and downtown, etc. And it is a safe neighborhood (knock on wood because all safe neighborhoods are safe until they are not). But. Location, location, location.

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