Yard Stuff: Journey into the Weed Forest

I realize it has only been a week since my last "Yard Stuff" post, but our yard is just so glorious, I couldn't help myself.  I guess it's like all those people with endless photos of their kids.  We can't get over how amazing the transformation has been from barren rock land to magical forest.  John and I went back to Michigan for the weekend and when we left Friday morning, our trees were still covered in buds with tightly curled baby leaves and all the weird little weeds spotting the yard were just small clusters. When we returned just a few short days later, we were shocked to find the buds had exploded into full leaves and the weeds had grown like, well, weeds.  Even at about noon on Monday, our yard was mostly shaded from the sun.  It's pretty awesome and now every night we go out and walk around just looking at all the new surprises.  So, here are some updated photos of our yard for your enjoyment.

This first set is from Monday the 25th, just FYI.  This photo is a view looking directly out into the yard from our patio.

This is a view looking to the right.  That house is our backyard neighbors.  I've never seen them.  Creepy backyard dwellers...

Looking up into the canopy.  What a beautiful day.

This is looking a little further to the right.  There's our little compost pile.  Or should I say pile o' leaves.  We need to get more green matter in there.  Funny thing... we've actually thrown some dead plants in there and then they spring back to life and we take them back out.  Either there's a fountain of youth in there or we need to better understand when a plant is dead and when it's just dormant for the winter...

This is a view of the right side yard, as if you were standing right outside our addition.  That darkish blob is one of our only evergreen trees, its species still TBD.

The back of our house, duh.

This is looking into the back backyard from the compost pile... next to the compost pile.  :)

This is the weird little weed that I commented on back in the last Yard Stuff update.  It has since grown a bunch of pretty yellow flowers.  It has even more now, despite being munched on by these partners in weed devastation.

Another photo of the beech tree we like.

Here is our lovely stump pile.  I bet weird things live in there.  Trolls or something.  OK, probably just bugs and stuff.

This is a frightening shot.  You got the wicked poison ivy vines, the cinder block herd, and a wild bichon sighting.

The purple azalea and its poor azalea neighbor who hasn't bloomed yet.  Show off.

The Three Bushketeers.

Now we're in the front yard looking up at the house... and part of John's car.  We've been kicking around the idea of building a carport to protect our cars from the sun/pollen/snow/bird poops.

Finally, this is looking from our parking area into the right side of our front yard.  If you look closely, you'll see a shot of the elusive Chewie and D.  It's like "Where's Waldo?" with adorable pups.  Maybe I'll make them some red and white striped shirts...

OK, now all the following photos are from today (Friday the 28th).  Update!!  We were finally able to identify this tree.  It's actually a chokecherry!  Today we were surprised to find these neat flowers sticking off of the tree. 

Just one of our many neat oak trees.  I don't know why the intersection of the branches with the trunk looks so weird.  Maybe it has something to do with the grid of nine nails sticking out of the side of the tree that we can't figure out why anyone would possibly want a grid of nine nails sticking out of a tree.

 And this middle azalea finally decided to join its pink brothers and bloomed, too!

I wish the creepy ghost bichon would stop following me.  :'(

Here's an update on our pansy flower box.  Look how happy, bright and proud they are.  They don't look at all like pansies to me.  Get it?  *laughing at own stupid joke*

These happy little faces remind me of Disney's "Alice in Wonderland" where all the flowers are singing in the garden to Alice.  What a weird movie.  Watching kids' shows and movies as an adult... there's some messed up stuff in there I didn't even realize.  No wonder we're all crazy after years of subliminal messages and innuendo.

OK, welcome to the Weed Forest.  Seriously, everything that isn't covered by tree pretty much looks like this.  It's wild.  Especially since hardly any of it was there when we left for Michigan and then we came back to this.  This is the front yard, by the way.

These plants are real weird.  They have small dark green leaves with purple veins.  They're all over the place and one day just grew these big ol' stalks.  It appears they will eventually have a flower on the top. Weird stuff.  Well, after some intensive Googling, I think these guys are Hieracium venosum, or the rattlesnake weed!  I'm on a plant identifying roll!

I don't know what this is either.  Kinda looks like tree leaves, but very small.  Maybe they're trees for the stump trolls.

More weed forest.  I'm pretty sure we're going to have to get a lawn mower just to cut down our weeds before they go all crazy on us, climb in through the windows at night and eat us in our sleep.  Or avoid complaints from the neighbors...

John thought this one looks like the top of a pineapple.

This is the tree where we saw our first Grafton owl.  He (or she) was sitting right on top of that broken off branch.

Well, that's all for now.  We just love our yard so much.  I'm pretty sure 80% of it is just weird weeds and anyone who knows anything about plants would think we're ridiculous to love our weeds, but you know, weeds are just plants that people don't want.  So, if we want them, they aren't really weeds, are they?  Ha!  Flawless logic.  Oh, and if you weren't jealous enough, check out this sly dog...

We have to be the luckiest people in the world.  :)