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JULY 2006

By 2006 the formal parterre-style sitting garden is essentially in place, though next up in the fall I'm adding an inner border of boxwoods in front of the roses and cypress trees on three sides (planted correctly this time, since the "landscaper" put the existing boxwoods in too spaced apart and uneven, and they're taking forever to grow in and make a solid hedge), and replacing the central agapanthus plants with three more Simplicity rose bushes (the agapanthus were temporary, since I couldn't find anymore matching rose bushes). Now the furnishings start getting added, including teak benches and chaise longues on the sunny gravel area I jokingly call "the beach" (since the landscaper filled it in with gravel deeper than it should have been).People often walk by and ask me what my secret is for a beautiful garden, and I always tell them the same thing—lots of poison.

      
DECEMBER 2003

Nothing looks like much in December of 2003. I'd only been back from New York City for about four months, and while I had a master plan in mind, I learned through trial and error that some tweaks were needed thanks to the hot Provence-like summers in the Sacramento Valley. The kitchen is still pretty dull at this point but much better than the first kitchen which lasted all of three weeks before it was torn out and redone (and its builder deported back to Mexico)!