Since the weather this weekend was so incredible, we were outside trying to figure out what our best plan of attack is on the vines that are overtaking the back of the barn and roof, the vines and roses growing on the “trellis” on the storage buildings and what we should do in the planters in the front of the house. Next weekend, a long-time friend of hubby’s is coming up for the weekend and he’s volunteered to help out where needed. Obviously there is always work to be done around here so we’re happy to have him come although we do feel a little guilty for taking his help. But he will be well fed while here so that hopefully counts for something. 🙂

So we essentially decided that instead of working on the covered patio or any other project next weekend, we will do yard work. The weather is supposed to be really nice again and perhaps even in the 70s…and because spring is coming, it is really essential that we get the ivy off the back of the barn and get the other plants growing on the storage buildings under control before they really start to bud and take over the buildings.

Here are a few photos of how things looked in July & August when we first got the house.

The green section of vines running along the wall of the house and above the doors of the storage rooms is one target. The vines are a mixture of roses (as you can see in the next picture) and what may either be wisteria (although we haven’t seen it bloom or drop seeds which it should have done already – we had a few huge ones growing over the patio of our old rental house) or just some other random and really aggressive vine. The wisteria (as we’ll call it for simplicity’s sake) will be coming out altogether. It’s just a nuisance up there, constantly trying to get under the roof of the rooms and causing trouble otherwise. So we’ll either replace it with grape vines or perhaps more roses after we determine how many roses we’ll be left with.

Here you can see I trimmed a lot of stuff back and none of the leaves had fallen off yet because it wasn’t yet winter. But with all the trimming, now there is basically very little left besides bare vines on the bottom which just looks strange. The vines are extremely dense behind the fencing that is being used as a trellis and it has eaten away at the face of the buildings. So we need to not only cut the vines back dramatically but will also be taking down the fencing and probably put up a new framework and fencing for the vines to grow along.

The garden is a whole other ballgame…and a major reason we will be ordering a bio container to put most of these clippings in. As you can see, the vines are starting to take over the barn and have also invaded inside, growing under the eves of the barn. We need to pull down all the vines from the roof and everything off the back off the barn since we will eventually be building a lean-to greenhouse on the back. Thankfully the roof here is not too dramatically sloped so we should be able to get on the roof to cut this stuff back and should also be able to hold on to the edge of the roof in a worst case scenario for extra safety. The stuff back here is mostly ivy and other aggressive vines with a rose or two sprinkled in which we will probably try to save just because it’s so old.

I think it’s safe to say we’ll have our work cut out for us and I haven’t even discussed the stuff in front of the house…but thankfully we have cut back most of that already, aside from one wildly growing vine, and otherwise just need to weed everything and get rid of the dead stuff.