the Backyard B'zmany hands make light work!

This year marks the second Christmas we have spent as a group, and as such, we’re a little short on traditions. However, we may have hit on one that will stick this year! As a group we went to see the Horizon Theatre’s production of The Santaland Diaries, and it was a rousing success.

For anyone who hasn’t seen this hilarious play, it’s taken from the David Sedaris book, “Holidays on Ice” and details his somewhat unwilling and humiliating experience as a Christmas elf at Macy’s. It’s a three person play, and the versatility and energy of the actors, Harold M. Leaver as Crumpet, Enoch King and Megan Hayes as everyone else, is unmatched! This was the third time I’ve seen it, and it is always fresh. Every year they add some details relevant to what’s going on in today’s news, but the gist of the story is unchanged.

The intimate venue encourages audience participation, and one unlucky – or lucky, depending on how you look at it – person is usually singled out and made a part of the play. It is bawdy and sarcastic, and not at all suited for children, which is why we liked it so much!

At the end we forced the cast to have their pictures taken with us, and it even looks like they’re having a good time!

Professional actors, all. We hope to see it again next year! It runs through January 1, 2012, so there’s still time for you to see it! Just contact the Horizon Theater box office and get yourself a ticket. Who knows, you may start a tradition of your own!

Last Sunday was the monthly meeting of the world famous Atlanta Gardening group, the BYB’z! and it was a hot one. These Southern summer meetings are always dicey. You never know how unbearable it will be, and it’s important to stay hydrated! We met at Sharon’s in the lovely city of Cass, GA, and were there to help her get her weeds under control. No, not her WEED, her weeds! Here’s what we started with:

This is the kind of thing that makes you tired.

We all face this: weeds have taken over. How is it that during the drought in Georgia which plagues us seemingly every year, when all the plants we love and have paid good money for are threatening to keel over, or have already bit the big one, the weeds thrive and survive? I guess that’s why they’re weeds. Maybe. Well, they are no match for the B’z in any case.

Oh now we feel better!

That didn’t take long at all. When four determined women are on a mission, anything or anyone had better get out of the way, and this includes chickweed and crabgrass, not to mention blackberry and greenbrier. While working to dispatch the weeds, we talked about the books we had read recently (House of Sand and Fog, Girl with the Dragon Tatoo, Teacher Man to name a few – we are all big readers) and the merits and demerits of each.

The thing about us is that we have so many things in common that we never lack for conversation. Another hot topic was things that surprised us about this group after we had been into it for awhile. One thing we never expected was how much fun it would be to work in someone else’s yard! As it turns out, it’s just as much fun as working in our own, and more, actually!

On to the next area: Along the fence, where we envision a cottage garden of lilies, daisies, black eyed Susans and the like.

Someday this will be a riot of color!

We have vision! Someday this will be gorgeous! Gardeners have faith galore, that’s for sure. Who else can take a barren piece of red clay and shale ground and create an oasis of beauty? We worked on this until lunch time, I’ll show you how it turned out in a minute.

Meanwhile, one of our favorite pastimes, besides gardening our brains out, is scrounging. No yard sale, thrift store or junk pile is safe from our creative eye. We look at things not as they are, but as how they could be. This is very useful for finding unique garden art, but sometimes isn’t so good when you’re dealing with real life. Note this fabulous use of cast offs and 99 cent bargains:

Isn't this grand?

After lunch we attacked the fence line with renewed vigor. We took the pole saw to dead branches and discussed how a row of azaleas would make a fine floral wall along the tree line. Isn’t this an improvement?

Much nicer vista now!

All of us are artistic, you really have to be to be a gardener, I think. Suzi paints, Jane quilts and paints with words, I make jewelry, and Sharon is a collage artist. We forced her to trot out her latest creations, and judge for yourselves, but we were blown away by their awesomeness! Here’s one that rocks my socks off:

Wow! Just. Wow.

And then there is this one:

Love the garden theme on this one!

We also spent a good amount of time lounging in the lovely sitting area we helped create for Sharon during our first meeting here, and discussing the possibility of an upcoming Bitchezz, oops! I mean B’z Book. That’s right, my friends, we could be on the road to a collaborative masterpiece. It’s all really hush hush, so don’t tell anyone, and seeing how many comments as we (don’t) get on this blog, I suppose there is no danger of word leaking out. Ha!

Speaking of that, we would really LOVE for you to comment on any and all of our posts. Just scroll to the bottom of any individual post and there you’ll find a little box set up JUST FOR YOU! We want to hear from you. We want to hear from your friends, your relatives, and your relative’s friends! And Lyle Lovett, we’d really like to hear from him. He’s from Texas, you know.

Next meeting will be at Nancy’s where we will be trying to make some sense of her driveway and front, as well as beating the ivy off the trees and spreading mulch. Bet you wish you could be there. Sorry. But I’ll write all about it so you’ll feel like you were there!

This month’s meeting was moved to accommodate Father’s Day next weekend, so we’re meeting a little early. Bowing to outside pressure, the name of our group has changed to the Backyard Beez, or BYBz. We feel this makes us more fit for public consumption. Some have been reluctant to share our garden adventures for fear of offending with our name, so now we are cleaned up and ready for our close up.

June’s meeting took place at Jane’s and we forgot a camera, so you’ll just have to imagine how bad the befores and how good the afters look!

Our task was backyard clean up. The yard has gone a little bit wild, so we have to tame it down again. This included bagging piles of limbs, cuttings and vines that she had in the back yard. Not exciting, but one of those tasks that is brutal and punishing if you have to do it all by yourself. We hauled about 15 bags to the street at the end of the day! We also cleaned up a little area she can see from her martini corner (am I allowed to say that?) or, if you like, her breakfast deck. This area will be made into a butterfly/hummingbird garden so she can enjoy their activities and antics while sipping an adult beverage in the evening.

Another garden pest was taking over the entire area – honeysuckle. We pulled up reams of it, and Sharon creatively fashioned some of it into a wreath as she pulled it up! We fought yellow jackets, poison ivy, and billions and billions of tree seedlings, but at the end of the day we prevailed! The area was nice and clean, ready for butterfly bushes and all manner of attractive new plants. We placed a bench against the fence and decorated it with a birdhouse and some found pots. A pleasing view and a good day’s work. I only wish we had pictures to show. Sigh.

This is a re-post from another garden blog (http://www.gardenrant.com/my_weblog/2010/01/in-which-we-hope-allan-does-not-break-a-leg.html#comments). How I wish I had known about this – I would have LOVED to see Allan shake his groove thang!

Begin re-post:

No, our friend, writer/grower/horticulturalist extraordinaire Allan Armitage has not lost his mind. He doesn’t even have Night Fever.  Rather, Allan is putting himself out there to support an important cause. See his note, below. On a non-dancing note, I am very excited about a recent introduction of Allan’s: the “Athens Yellow” climbing dicentra. It climbs? And it’s yellow? That’s enough to make me feel like dancing! Maybe not the The Hustle, though.

To My Friends in Horticulture:

I know this is hard to believe, but I have been asked to participate in the Athens-area chapter of Dancing With the Stars—as a star! I would not have agreed to make a fool of myself, except that it is a major fundraiser for Project Safe, a terrific organization working to end abuse against women. The world is a tough place for many, and having a support group like this makes a huge positive difference. For those of you not familiar with Project Safe, read more here.  Recently this organization has experienced an unprecedented rise in demand for its services. More than ever it relies on  local community events like Dancing with Athens Stars to provide financial support.

I am practicing hard for the “Audience Favorite Award” which is given to the couple who receives the most votes, both during the show and in the months leading up to it. I will keep everyone involved as the dance date, Mar 21, approaches.

So I am asking for your votes, not for me but for Project Safe.  You can laugh at me while giving.  Here’s how it works:

Each vote is $1 donated to Project Safe, and voting early and often is definitely encouraged!  You can vote in several ways. Voting through the website is probably easiest. Go to the site and click on the Dancing with Athens Stars button. You’ll see my name and my beautiful and talented partner Liza Pitts [shown with Allan, above] as couple #9.

By the way, I will be doing The Hustle.  I never heard of The Hustle, but there you go. I will keep you up to date here and on my site.

—Allan Armitage

Hats off to Allan and I hope the gals at Garden Rant don’t mind the re-post!

This month it was Suzi’s turn to harness the power of the Beez at work. We had an honorary Bee in attendance: Dana!

Dana provided all the lovely photography for this entry. She also brought some terrific food to share with us! We want Dana to come back again and again!

Our project this month was to provide some clarity for Suzi. Path-wise, that is. Sometimes we allow everyday obstacles to slow us down. We recognize them as irritants, yet somehow continue to live with them. Gardening is a lot like life.

Suzi had an area in front of her house where she frequently walked, yet she was always getting smacked around by an out-of-control weeping cherry tree and tripped up by some gardenias who were muscling their way in front of her. There was no clear path to the hose either; she had to step around various plants to get to the spigot. Adding to the general chaos, her tree-form lorapetalums were seriously out of round.

Enter the BYBz to fix things up! But first, a photo-op.

Photo op for Beez

So, here is what we started with:

Something must be done. First: Out with those gardenias. There are four in this spot. We think we’ll leave one.

The cool thing about the way we BYBz work together is that we each find our own job once the plan is laid out for us. We all seem to gravitate toward different things, so there’s never any bickering over who gets to dig out the gardenias and who gets to prune the lotapetalums. We pick a job and do it without a whole lot of discussion. Just one of the very many reasons we rock!

We get right to work, and we frequently have to be coerced into stopping to eat lunch. One of the rules we made when our group was first formed was that the only thing the hostess had to provide was water. We were to bring our own lunch and so not burden the hostess with feeding us. However, that’s one rule we all seem to love to break, as feeding each other is lots of fun, too! This time lunch was especially yummy, as Dana contributed a wonderful bruschetta-like treat, and Suzi contributed greens for a salad from her garden. Fresh peaches from South Georgia made their way to the table, too. Yum!

After our lunch break, it was back to work. We had cleared out the gardenias and settled them in their new homes, along with some hellebores (common name Lenten Rose) and iris, pruned the cherry tree back, and now it was time to create a pathway.

Then we re-purposed some stepping stones from another part of the yard.

The stones are set, and ground cover will be grown around them. Doesn’t this look better? It feels like a real path now, and the flower garden seems like more of a garden somehow.

It was a productive and fun time, as usual, and we never cease to be amazed at what only four women can accomplish in one day. It certainly never seems like work! Don’t you wish YOU could be an honorary Bee for a day? Well, maybe you can. Just ask!

This month’s lucky recipient was Jane!  We were saddened, however, that Sharon was under the weather, so to speak, and couldn’t attend. But the Universe smiled on us once again with a sunny and mild day. It seems like whenever we meet the weather is just perfect!

Suzi and Nancy gathered at Jane’s to drink coffee, assess the situation, and see what needed to be done. After missing two month’s meetings due to winter weather, we were all ready to get outside and get our gardening on! So we outlined the day’s projects, marshaled tools, and determined which plants were needed to spice things up, then we headed to Pike Nurseries to drool over the rows and rows of luscious plants, and make the purchases. Did you know that Pike guarantees their plants for life?? That’s pretty amazing. So hold on to your receipts…

Three winter daphnes, three lorapetalum (purple diamond), a camellia and one spreading evergreen

After the purchases were made, it was back to Jane’s to begin the process of placing the new plants, cleaning out the spaces where a little more garden definition was needed, and getting to work. It’s funny how we all seem to gravitate to certain jobs and take up our own mission to accomplish.

We pool resources and tools. Here are some of our favorites!

Jane had removed two dead evergreens from the area in front by the steps leading up to the house. It left a rather large vacancy that we planned to fill with two of the lorapetalum and all three of the winter daphnes. We also have lots of fun gathering all available yard accents and ornaments to be redistributed to more visible and appropriate places.

There's a lot of blank space there!

Some of the yard ornaments that need a new place.

Although we didn’t get a picture of it, the Wonderful Worx mulcher was in attendance, and we were able to process the pine straw and leaves that we raked out of the beds into superb mulch! This is a handy dandy yard tool that will saves hundreds of dollars by allowing you to make your own mulch. Don’t send leaves to the landfill – spin them into gold!!

This area needs help!!

The area above is a bed for lilies, and ground cover. There are some roses as well. It was not well defined, and had become quite overgrown. Early spring is a great time to clean out beds like this, because the plants are breaking out enough to be visible, but not enough to be harmed by raking around them. We raked out all the pine straw and redefined the edges of the bed with rocks.

The new plantings by the steps!

These lorapetalums will grow to about 4.5′ tall – not too tall for the space. They will add drama and punch all year round with their glossy dark purple foliage and hot pink flowers. The daphne will fill out, and when it blooms it will treat guests to a wonderful fragrance as they come up the stairs. We placed the birdbath and bells as focal points.

This frog was a bit of an eyesore before. But we found just the right spot for him, and now he is a handsome addition to the overall landscape.

The church has found a sheltering home

The church birdhouse fits nicely beneath the branches of this variegated aucuba. Tucked into this little space it makes a charming accent.

A new and beautiful view

Now the view from the top of the stairs is of a neat and tidy garden bed boasting a new camellia and the third lorapetalum. Later in the year the lilies and roses will add to the colorful display.

We even styled the entryway!

This would make anyone glad to be home. We Bitchezz are big on details!

The olive oil jar finds a new home, too!

Fortunately Jane had a wealth of things to work with in her yard! We made a triptych of metal vine supports and placed the olive oil jar in front of them. A clematis will weave it’s way through the supports which will make a beautiful sight indeed.

We think that Yard of the Month will be a certainty! This one gets our votes! What do you think?

Hello Bitchezz!

We are now fine and online! Now we can all update our exploits, share our garden tips and photos, and keep up to date on upcoming meetings. What could be better? Our next meeting is at Jane’s on the third Sunday in February. Hopefully the weather won’t be completely miserable and we’ll be able to work some magic as we usually do.

The Southeastern Flower Show is coming up Feb. 25-27th at the Cobb Galleria. Maybe we should gather there and gain inspiration for the coming year. It’s always wonderful to share an event like that with fellow plant whores. We can renew old acquaintances with employers gone-by and generally whoop it up.

Leave a comment, give an opinion-this is our year, girls!