Raison d'etre

"Our Lakefront, taken early morning, September 2010"

David and I want to create a garden that people will want to come and see.  It will take many years. This blog was created to document our journey. We are both long time gardeners, but this will be our first garden together.  We bought a lake front property in 2005 and every year since then, we've added a little to the garden.  It's almost 5 acres, so there's a lot of potential, but it's also going to be a lot of hard work.

David keeps a meticulous data base of all our purchases, and this is invaluable, but decades from now we won't remember details of what we did, and how we came to make the decisions we did. This blog will fulfill that function and be a resource in future years.

So if you have come here by chance and have read this far, please remember this is a personal journey and it wasn't written to please anyone but myself... oh, and perhaps David.  But you're welcome to stay and journey with us. 

Rebecca & David Kelly

Vital Statistics

Location:  40 minutes north of Kingston, Ontario

Size:  5 acres, plus 2 islands

Zone: 5

Inception:  2010, with some experimentation before

Special Features: The property is very hilly and on a point. Therefore, there are a lot of micro climates and potential to create many different kinds of garden, from xeriscape to water, from full sun to full shade, with views of the lake from almost every inch.

Challenges: 
Canadian Shield, with not much usuable soil, lots of rocks to get rid of.
Deer and other critters.
We don't live there yet, so everything planted has to look after itself for most of the year.
No hydro, so no power tools.
No tap, no hose, all water has to be hand carted from the lake.