I’m pretty excited, I was going through some old folders on my computer last night, organizing things, and I found these pictures from when Heather and I drove to Nova Scotia in July 2007.

I had thought these photos had been lost last time I upgrade my computer but it appears not!

I’ll update this post later with some further notes/thoughts.

Heather and I just got back from a week in Europe, we went to Amsterdam, checked some stuff out there, then went down to Belgium on a EuRail train to visit a friend.

I’ve set up all our pictures in a series of slideshows on Flickr, you can view the collection here or just check out the related content below!

We encountered all sorts of strange oddities while we were over there, but I’m still a little jet-lagged so will write about them later!

Amsterdam: Getting There

Amsterdam: Settling In

Around Amsterdam

Heading to Belgium

In Bruges

Heading Home

We wanted to get rid of the ugly, rotting fence in front of our place, so we did some checking around and decided to get a cedar hedge put in, instead of another fence. Sure, they require maintenance and upkeep, but I think the benefits outweigh the work involved in keeping it up. It’ll give us more privacy, cut down on road noise, and should stop a lot of garbage from accumulating in the previously unused corner of our lot.

I looked at the cedars they sell at big box garden centres, the “emerald cedars” which are 6-8′ tall, but apparently those are better for decks and don’t really fill in to become a solid hedge. They also would have been cost prohibitive at around $20 each, and a ridiculous amount of work for me to plant myself. After a bit of searching I found the Cedar Guys, who are a small, local operation just northwest of here.

They have great prices, provide a warranty for their work, and sell Ontario white cedars which is exactly what we were looking for. I took a few pictures of the job coming along (see related)

These guys were real pros, they came in with three guys and two trucks, and had the trench dug and the cedars (all 170 of them) planted in around three hours. They cleaned up the job site and overall Heather and I are both very satisfied with the new hedge!

The plants and shrubs are all coming into bloom, making for a pretty nice photo!

When we bought our house it was December so we had no idea what the gardens would be like.

I guess the previous owners were pretty handy in the garden by the looks of it, hopefully we can keep it going!