Planting Limestone Path

Sorry the picture quality is a little dark here.  It's a shady garden and I'm finding it a little hard to photograph well. 

My plan is for this to be very natural looking and have the hostas and ferns kind of 'spill over' on the walkway, here and there.  For now I have black plastic garden edging along the right side to hold the soil and water in, but I'm hoping to be able to remove it (or have it covered up by foliage) before too long. 

Along the right side are several types of hostas  including Minuteman, Lancifloria, Longissima, Blue Mouse  Ears, a couple of ferns (Frizelliae and Lady in Red) and some violets.   

On the left side, between the walkway and the house, I have foxglove and monkshood, bee balm, bleeding heart, periwinke, bugleflower, lamina, and some hostas, including June, Golden Tiara, and Gold Standard. 

I love how everything looks but I have no idea if I have too many or too few plants in here.  With luck I might have just the right amount. 

We will see. 

Finished Planting the Front Beds

May 2, 2010 - I added the dwarf burning bush and mock orange to the front today. Not that you can really see it in the picture. I'm hoping I didn't plant too much in here, but I'm told that I can prune everything to the size I want.

I know nothing about shrubs so this will be a learning experience for me! I can't wait to see what this will look like in a few months.

This is the other side of our front steps, and the limestone path that we put in last fall. I planted some ground covers in between the rocks, which are meant to be able to withstand some foot traffic - wooley thyme and Irish moss.

I'm hoping to have hostas all along the right side of the walk, and maybe some ferns to break it up. I'm hoping it will be a nice contrast tot he bleeding hearts and monkshood on the left side of the path. So far I have about seven hostas there, a 'Lancifloria', a 'Longissimo', two 'First Frosts', two 'Wide Brims' and an unknown variety that my friend, Karen, gave me.