My Dream Garden?

One of my favourite garden bloggers and authors, Gayla Trail (yougrowgirl.com, @yougrowgirl) recently launched a new concept on her website, the “Grow Write Guild”. The purpose of the guild is to provide some inspiration for garden bloggers (let’s face it, there are a few of us out there).  On first glance, the initial prompt seemed straightforward enough: to write about your first plant.  Not too difficult, right? Somehow, though, it seemed to get all messy and complicated….should I write about my first house plant? first garden? first rose bush? etc etc. You get the picture. That went nowhere and everywhere all at once. I moved on to Gayla’s second prompt, to write about a fantasy or dream garden. This was an interesting topic for me.  I don’t usually think about gardening in these terms.  I have wonderful days in the garden, and days when I anguish over it, but I don’t really think of it as existing in an ideal state (it’s a bit like motherhood that way!).  That’s not to say my garden couldn’t be improved. It’s a tiny garden, more urban than suburban in scope. In the end, my ideas for a dream garden boiled down to three wishes:

Wish #1: My current compost pile is not so much a pile as a plastic bin. And while the plastic bin makes quite beautiful compost, it just doesn’t make that much. Wish number 1 would be to have a real compost pile. I recently saw a picture of Martha Stewart’s compost pile, which was huge.  Yes, I actually felt compost pile envy.

Wish #2: Wish number 2 would be to have a garden shed (with a window!). To have a space to hang out, plant seeds, dream about the garden….truly that would be garden heaven.  Of course there would be a climbing rose growing up the side.

Wish #3: I love plants and I love trailing through my favourite garden centres. Roses, perennials, edibles - there are always new ones I want to try. But where to put them? Wish number 3 would be to magically have room for the new plants that capture my attention. A lilac tree? Plenty of room! A few squash plants? No problem! A peony? I’ve got just the spot!  You see how this is going. 

These are the things that would add up to a dream garden for me.  So, if there are any magic genies out there, with a bit of spare time, you know where to find me…..