Luke's Garden

Luke playing in his "Rock Box" in his garden

My Mother-in-Law, Meg was visiting Joel and I and the children these last two and a half weeks, so I found myself with some lovely time to do several projects I had been aching to get started on.  My first priority was to begin Luke's "secret" garden.  Instead of a swing set, or a large wood structure with slides, or plastic play houses, or turtle sandboxes, I have been dreaming up an imaginative play area inside my back hedges for Luke (and Sophia too). 

I started with painting a sign with Luke on a piece of left over wood under Joel's workbench.  I drew block letters and he and I painted them with acrylic paint.  He painted all over the board and I simply kept painting over the letters in bright colors as he went.  When it was dry, we nailed it to that small tree trunk.  Luke loved every minute of it.  During Luke's nap I picked up some slate pavers, a blue dragon fly that flaps in the wind, and three bags of pea-gravel from my local home improvement store.

I loosened the dirt where I wanted the pavers and kind of buried them into position.  I dumped the three bags of pea gravel behind the hedge at the end of the path to create Luke's Rock Box.  We decided to go with pea gravel instead of sand to deter cats from using it as a litter box, and because it provides great drainage after a good rain.  Luke plays in his Rock Box for hours with his CAT construction vehicles and matchbox cars.

I planted three grasses along the fence back in the Rock Box to provide some privacy.  They're small now, but they'll work quite nicely next year. 

Here's the blue dragon fly being driven on by Luke's digger.

Luke and I planted some shade loving plants together in his garden: Astilbe, hosta, lobelia, Japanese painted fern, and caladium.

We added this fish wind chime, from my mom, high up in the hedge where the children can't reach it since it's made of glass.  Luke loves to watch it spin and reflect the sun on the floor of his garden.

I've only scratched the surface on the things I'd like to create for the children back in the hedge.  I'm looking forward to making it into a whole world of play and wonder!