De Flower Bed

Finally finished the "flower bed" around the sweet gum tree. Not sure that I like it, but this is as good as it gets.
Midway through:















Completed:

Not-so-Sweet Gum

As nice as the sweet gum tree looks from a distance (especially the autumn colors), there is a downside. The sweet gum tree has a lot of shallow roots that makes it difficult for grass to grow, although the weeds are doing quite well.

I decided to do something about the weeds that thrive around the base of the sweet gum tree. Gonna put in a flower bed. Not really thrilled about the labor of it, but really tired of the ugly weeds and the lack of grass.

In the pic, the green piles are the seeds dropped by the sweet gum tree - they are all over.

In the gutters...

So now I am up on the roof of my house, cleaning out the gutters. I needed to get to the upper roof, but the ladder would not reach, so I had to rig a step to get to the upper roof from the lower roof. Kind of ghetto, but it works. Using my experience as a climber, I decided to put in 2 anchor bolts for safety - note the climbing gear.



Views from the roof:
Front Yard


Back Yard:

My newest nemesis

Can you say Poison Ivy? It is ALL OVER the place down by the creek bed (ditch)!

Bought the industrial size of Round-Up for Poison Ivy! Sprayed it all over - now my backyard/creekbed (ditch-bed) classifies as a toxic waste site.

The new arrival...

Today marked the arrival of my new tree - an Autumn Blaze Maple.
Its pretty big - 17' - and pretty pricey, but I wanted something to fill the huge void where the city had removed a large portion of an old elm tree that was threatening to fall on the house.