When we first bought our house I thought how easy it would be to mow the lawn because there was nothing but lawn around it. No trees, no gardens, easy maintenance.
And I imaged that worked really well for Florance who lived there until she was over 100 years old. It was only in the last years of her life that she stopped mowing her own lawn.
Soon after moving in we planted three maple trees in front of the house. Then we added two lilac bushes, two pine trees and a cherry tree.
And every year we’ve planted more trees.
The first trees we had a nursery deliver and plant. But for the past three years, we’ve been finding smaller trees, often at the end of the season when they’re on sale and planting them ourselves.
We’ve become big fans of River Birches. They create a good cover which blocks both the sound and sight of the cars going by on Route 22 and they grow quick.
In the spring we planted a River Birch and a Sycamore tree. Last weekend we planted a Butterfly Magnolia. Today we planted two more River Birches a Maple tree and a Pinky Winky Hydrangea.
We’ve gotten really good at finding tall trees on sale that nurseries don’t want to have to hold onto over the winter.
We’ve also gotten good at planting our trees.
Jon and I have it down. I do most of the digging, and burying, Jon gets whatever we run out of (usually peat moss or mulch) at the hardware store, and does the watering. My part is quick and satisfying. I plant the tree and leave the rest to Jon, who has the job of watering them every day for a week or two.
This evening as I sat on the front porch I thought about how we sat on there when we first got the house and watched the cars go by.
Now there’s a few spaces between the trees where you can still see the cars, but the road is mostly hidden. And in a few years, the new trees we planted on the other side of the driveway will provide the same kind of cover there.
We planted these trees for us, but the trees will hopefully live on after we’re gone. I do hope whoever lives in our house after us, appreciates the trees as much as we do.
