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Did y'all know the Durham County landfill is having free dumping every Saturday this month? They're open late too: from 8 to 3.

We discovered this when we showed up there yesterday morning, and found a line about 4 times longer than normal. Luckily the line moved very fast, since no one had to go over the scale. Unfortunately we weren't dumping, just there to buy a truckload of topsoil. The topsoil is gorgeous. Black, rich, and crumbly. We're adding it to the new bed at the front of the yard. Which is coming together, unfortunately not as fast as I would like. I think it's going to take another 2 truckloads after this one to fill the bed, but we only have one more weekend before I have to take a month off. Well, we can only get done as much as we can. As long as we get enough dirt on there that I can plant my seedlings, I'll be happy.

After the dump I had to go to a work meeting for a couple of hours, and Georg did a ton of weeding on the bed along the driveway. Because he is awesome. On my way home I got my roses from the mailcenter, which took up some time getting them unpackaged and watered and so forth. After that I dug the hole for the Crepescule by the house. The place where I had intended to put it had a couple of big tree roots right under the soil, so I decided to remove a big salvia a couple of feet over and put the rose in that spot. Problem solved! I think the Crepescule is going to look really nice there. The flowers are orange & it's supposedly a robust good repeat bloomer, and disease resistant. Which is important to me because I'm not willing to spray synthetics. I figure I'm making a one-time investment in roses as an experiment. If they can survive with good soil and the occasional treatment of organics like "Cornell formula" (baking soda and horticultural oil), fantastic. If they need constant pampering and weekly fungicide sprays, then I don't want them in my garden.

We also put down landscape fabric and bark chip mulch on the path around the septic tank bed. I really need a better name for that bed. I mean the area where we took out the septic tank a year ago. Last fall I planted asparagus in there so maybe I should call it the asparagus bed. Although there aren't any signs of life yet from the asparagus.

Anyway, last summer the path around that bed got all weedy and it was kind of hard to walk around it. So we put down landscape fabric and that big chip mulch. I must say, I was surprised by how much better it looks. That whole area looks so tidy and pulled together now.

I feel like I did some other things here and there, but now I can't remember. Still, it was a lovely day. Beautiful weather, nice to be outside getting things accomplished. I'm trying to focus on garden tasks that, if I do them now they will save us work later on. Like covering the path now, before it gets all weedy.

Today hasn't been as productive, because first of all, we're both tired from yesterday. And secondly, Georg had to work and then we had a party to go to. Which was a lot of fun, it was the birthday of a friend we don't see nearly enough. We have an extra hour of daylight tonight so I may still get something done.