it's a jungle out there.....

or as i like to call it, 

the incredible shrinking raised bed...
i'd say the incredible shrinking yard, but our yard is about an acre.  as we get deep into the dog days of summer, everything is lush, very green and beautiful.  

here are the pictures of our front and back yards as promised....

this and the next pictures are the garden in the front of the house just past the porch.  to the right you can see the backside of Petey, our gargoyle. he looks weird because i took these pictures just after watering. this bed includes a butterfly bush, shrub roses, spiderwort and stella d'oro lilies surrounding the gazing ball.

i got that for mother's day a few years back.  it's gorgeous!

when i was watering the gardens the hose made a rainbow....i love rainbows....

this bed is in front down toward the street.  just some perennials and grasses under an oak tree.

the backyard has a couple of willow trees that we planted a few years ago.  they are getting so big so fast....we also have a large retention pond where we have been breeding our mosquito population this summer.  and since the mosquitos need to eat, i usually stand out in the yard for a few minutes every evening so they can pig out...  ugh!!  have the mosquitos where you live been worse than usual this summer?  it almost makes me want the colder weather just to get rid of them.  (almost).

this bed has russian sage and black eyed susan.  there is a small lilac bush just to the right of that bed and a golden curly willow to the left. 

this jungle, i mean, garden, is don's pride and joy.  i would try and point out where things are planted but i don't know where they are anymore.  my machete is on order...

don likes to grow sunflowers in his vegetable garden.....he thinks it adds interest and i guess it does.  he is constantly hacking off the bottom leaves so the garden actually gets some sun.....and yes, i painted the wire fence surrounding the garden turquoise.....

this year he had some help planting the sunflowers from the birds.  they dropped seeds everywhere in the yard..... 

randomly in the flower beds...

in the flower pots, and yes, that is a sunflower in the flower pot.

they also grace either side of the steps leading to the kitchen here...

and on the other side.  this ones head is so big and heavy it is in a permanent state of "bent over".

the blue jays love the sunflower seeds and will hang upside-down to get at them when the heads are like this.  you can't see it very well, but don has this sunflower staked with a hockey stick...

there is a huge one growing near the window too!!!

on the east side of the house our purple robe locust has a companion this year too....

another sunflower....

entwined in the crook of the tree trunk and branches....

underneath the kitchen window is our very tall rudbeckia plant...it is about 3 feet taller than me.

the large tree on the left is a river birch and is really beautiful, with its cinnamon colored peeling bark. to the right is the vegetable garden and, last but not least,

the incredible encroaching pumpkin plants.  our neighbor's property starts where the black lava rock is on the right side.  their deck is just to the right of the big pine trees.  there is usually a pumpkin growing near their deck every year.  we let them keep that one.... :)

so that concludes the tour of our little piece of nature......thank you for stopping by.