Well, right now it surely is a secret, as the hedge plants which will hopefully one day form the walls of our Secret Garden are only two months old! One of the "Mail-A-Way" Nurseries was having a sale.... and you know both me with a sale and me with plants... not a good combination to bring about a lot of resistance on my part. I could purchase 100 privet hedge seedlings for only $42.00!!!!! Wow! When they arrived they were as promised between 8" and 12" tall, bareroot and dormant, thus having mostly just leaf buds... so it really looked like I had been suckered into buying just some kindling with hairy roots on one end. Full of hope, Eric and I staked out a fairly precise rectangle in the clearing behind Acorn Cottage and methodically planted each of the 100 sticks in their new home. Due to their small size and the fact we would need to mow the grass back there, we cautiously marked every third or fourth plant with a piece of hot pink marking tape to protect it from being either trampled or mistakenly "taken out" with the weedwacker. Now, privet hedge is reputed to be quite a speedy grower and after two months in the ground I am happy to report the rumors might be true as they are already covered with leaves and starting to branch. Our vision is to one day have a walled garden with a wooden door as an entryway, behind which we will place the statue of Bacchus, standing under an arbor mounded with grape vines, a small bistro table set in the foreground, quadrant raised bed gardens forming paths on which to walk through the secret space to sneak a refreshing glass of wine and a little romance.
