Grass Seed Experiment

I finally leveled the rocky, bamboo root infested mound that sat at the southeast corner of our backyard.  I added some of that grass seed/fertilizer/mulch all-in-one products by Pennington.  I also spent an hour breaking up the soil around my new shade garden.and raking in some 3 year old grass seed. 
It is supposed to get hot later this week, so not great timing, but I'm giving it a go.

leveled mound at southeast corner

shade garden at north east corner

Ajuga

My step-mother-in-law also sent over some Ajuga.  I don't know much about it except that it has purple flowers.  When I googled it it came up as "invasive" which seems to describe just about every groundcover out there.  Makes sense, since the point of groundcover is to quickly and thoroughly cover the land.  The description also read "sun/part shade" and I planted it in more of a part shade/shade area so hopefully it won't go too crazy and cover everything.

Ajuga in front row

New Ajuga planted

Add some ferns and..voila!

View from the deck

I dug up some wayward ferns from around the backyard and moved them into the loamy soil where the side fence used to be.  I also split up a existing hosta into 6 mini hostas to hhelp fill out the area  Cheap and easy! 
Now, just one question: what do i do with the dry shade in front of the bed?  Try some grass?

New Planting on the North Side

After fenced removal - before planting

After fenced removal - before planting

After fenced removal - after planting

After fenced removal - after planting

I added hosta elegans, pink rhododendrons, hosta frances williams, Viva redhead coleus, and japanese forest grass.'all gold"

More from Scott

Shade Inspiration - Scott Arboretum

June and I love taking walks in Swarthmore College's Scott Arboretum.  I love how they put together shade areas.  It IS an arboretum after all, so pretty much everything is shaded by trees.  Here they have purple heuchera, blue hostas, and gold japanese forest grass.  This is the combo I'm trying to recreate in our yard beside the deck.  I already purchased six forest grass plants.  I can't wait to get started, but first, the tree company is clearing out the brush, taking out some small junk trees, and pruning the large ones.  Only another week to go!

Bed B11 inspiration

A shady spot right next to our deck.  I need to bring in some color, but i don't want anything too high maintenance. 

Late summer pics

Just a quick recap of what is going on out in the back yard in mid-September (need to weed!):
Vegetable garden with the last of the tomatoes, marigolds, rosemary and broccoli and beet seeds. B7

Front porch garden with marigolds, sedum, and rose of sharon still blooming.  Red gaillardia still hanging in there. B6

 Garage side garden - needs some serious weeding, but the hostas are doing well. B4

 Daylily bed B5. It really was just all daylilies!

 Back fence line - B10

 North fence line B11. After I removed some thorny shrub.  I thought it was a rose of some sort, but the blooms were just tiny white flowers - definitely not worth the thorny mess. 

 Screen porch ferns B1

 New japanese holly and chysanthemums. B2

 Family room bed B3