Bella Donna and Barbie

Here is one small corner of my garden happily situated - until Donna arrives with her rototiller that is! I am so grateful to have such great friends. Every year Donna spends half her summer at my house helping with the gardens, and Barbie often comes too when she can. They are both sisters to me. 

And what's going on here in the photo below is Donna and Barbie decided to join me in cutting up about a third acre of really wild landscape with her rototiller. Which is great - except she showed up wearing a string bikini and a sari. You know the kind from India with the bead fringe flying all over the place? Right. So here's how we both learned NOT to wear sari's within about a yard of a rototiller. Because the beads got sucked up into the motor mid process of cutting out sod and here you see Donna and our sister Barbie attempting to repair it (before her boyfriend Mike finds out she sort of "borrowed" stuff out of his shed). I am not in the picture because I was standing there laughing my head off and taking this photo. :) I am sure you can imagine how absolutely hilarious this was!

Here they are again - posing with tools. We did a lot of work this year but have a ways to go yet. We are already planning to be more diligent about the cutting and weeding, and have also sorted out a ton of varieties that work  versus those that don't for our temperamental northern climate.

I am just so happy to have them both in my world. :)