Me, the ingrate.

[rimturse]

I know she means well, but...spring is barely here and we're back to the usual garden issues with my mother wanting to plan our garden and insist on buying or planting plants for us that:

- we have repeatedly told her that we do not want
- are delicate and labour intensive

Her reply to me saying that I only want plants that are hardy, low maintenance and that spread like weeds? I quote: "I don't like plants like that."

Well guess what? It's OUR garden. WE are the ones who have to take care of the plants, and besides the daily housework and taking care of the pets. WE are running three businesses between us and renovating the house and garden, plus I'm struggling with MS fatigue.

I am not a monster. My mother has a beautiful tiny garden, which in summer is an explosion of scent, colour and structures...and she loves gardening. She digs up all her bulbs every year and store each in the appropriate manner before planting them again later. She keeps larges patches of bare soil in a pristine weeded condition, she prunes, cuts, plants and ties up plants, and I can understand that with such a dedication to gardening it is difficult accepting a vision like this:
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_72M1OP89FoY/SfQCnsiGOxI/AAAAAAAAA5c/sbPCWjl9vcY/s400/lupiner.jpg

when you own and prefer a vision more like this:
http://www.illustratedlight.com/images/David%20Clack/flower_garden.jpg

So no...it's not that I don't understand where she's coming from and it's not that I can't see how absolutely cool it would be to have 4 - 4,5 acres of land looking like her mental image, which is probably something like this:

http://hearthunger.com/__oneclick_uploads/2008/01/flower-garden.JPG

...but I am a grumpy, grouchy realist with limited funds, time and energy. Plus I like organic, "wild" gardens and simplicity.

Comments

[darkspires.livejournal.com]

May, that last picture would have required three full time professional gardeners working eight hours a day for five days a week in season to keep all that manicured and watered and have the grass cut. When beds are that packed, it is very intensive to weed them, carefully, by hand. IMO, this sort of thing is only ok for city parks needing a showcase setting.

I happen to like the first picture a lot. You know you are going to have to put your foot down, don't you? There is a huge difference in the sort of plants that can go in a very big garden and those that will do nicely in a tiny patch. Twee flowers, suitable for a small and sheltered garden, will look lost in a large plot. I know where you are coming from as I used to manage volunteers working on the town flowerbeds and parks. It was a constant fight with them to try to make them understand why they couldn't have the expensive, delicate, high maintenance product. One of them went against me once, and donated and planted this stuff in her designated bed. I planted what should have gone in there in a holding bed and sure enough, it had mostly died after three weeks due to lack of being planted in special dirt and lack of constant care.

[frigg.livejournal.com]

Yup, you are absolutely spot on with the gardeners needed to maintain a large garden like that. Judging from the size of the people standing in that last photo, my mother's garden is probably a bit smaller than the middle section with the two large round beds separated by the smaller bed between them - and she spends a significant amount of time in her garden.

I am trying to put my foot down, the problem is that I say "NO.THANK.YOU! WE.DO.NOT.WANT.THIS.PLANT!" - and she goes right out and either buys it fully grown or plant it from seedling to present to us later. In summer, she'll sometimes even try to sneak in the garden to plant something without me noticing it.

Good tactic with letting your volunteer plant her own flowerbed and watch it die. I'm guessing she didn't insist on delicate, high maintenance plants again? :)

[darkspires.livejournal.com]

It sounds to me as if she has run out of space in her own yard and cannot flex her need to develop. If you have a place that you really don't mind having that regimented mess, perhaps let her make a flowerbed on the understanding that she is the one to care for it entirely and she can put in all her delicate high maintenance flowers there. Once they all die on her, or she finds the effort too much, then she might just back off. At least you would be in the position of saying to her 'We tried that and it didn't work', which is something you already know and she won't yet accept.

This is what worked with my volunteer. She began to understand why public gardens can't have delicate flowers and why those flowers need to be more than the size of a thumb tack. Large gardens are viewed from a distance most of the time.

[frigg.livejournal.com]

Hmmm letting her loose on her own bit of land could be the solution. I'll have to be very sneaky about it, though, as she already thinks she has enough work in her own garden (clearly she's delusional about that one. *grin*).

[footlingagain.livejournal.com]

Just to say - very late, on a drive-by posting - that the last garden is my idea of hell. Horticulturally speaking.

I'm with you on the relaxed and simple approach.

You could always pave all of your garden and tell your mother that you had to do it for the dogs ;-)

[frigg.livejournal.com]

*lol*
A completely paved property would definitely get the neigbours talking.

[(Anonymous)]

I think you should find the edge of your property, the farthest from the house, and tell her that is her little plot to do with whatever she pleases!
Kelli

[frigg.livejournal.com]

Well, I wouldn't mind an opulent flower patch somewhere. I'd have to trick her, though, because she would refuse it if I simply gave her a bit of land to play on, since she thinks she already has plenty of work in her garden. :)