Well, it’s Week 2 of the Pocket Patio Project for the Spring One Room Challenge and I guess we are really doing this!  I plunked down most of my budget for the project this week to order the new doors I need for the entrance.

Since I’ve already spent that chunk of change, making the rest of my ideas work is going to require some creativity and a miracle or two!

If you missed the first post, check out Week One where I explain a little bit about what exactly the One Room Challenge is and share the embarrassing BEFORE photos of the patio.  I use the term patio here loosely, as it is more of an abandoned parking lot vibe at the moment.  

It gets filtered morning sun and one corner gets early afternoon sun, at least in the summer, but the rest of it is quite shady since this is the north side of the house - which is lovely and cool in the heat of summer. 

I’m wanting a prettier entrance to my office from the patio, and functional doors, thus the door purchase.  I’ve ordered 3/4 light fiberglass double doors which means the windows will let in more light and view…a view I am hoping to improve during this project. 

And they will be better insulated and more durable than the current wooden ones that are a bit of a disaster with their cracked panels and rotting jambs. The current ones have given me about 35 years of service, so they don’t really owe me anything.  The new ones will outlive me so I won’t have to do this again! 

The other exciting development this week was another visit to the nursery to start procuring the plants I will need to transform the wasteland into a woodland garden.  For someone who doesn’t actually garden, I’ve been spending a fair bit of time looking at plants!

I need plants for the existing raised beds that at one time had a few hostas transplanted from other places in the yard, but they never really did much and seem to have mostly petered out instead of multiplying like they were supposed to. 

But the good news is, now I get to put in more variety and some other interesting plants. Though there are a staggering variety of hosta plants alone! 

We seem to grow primarily rocks in this yard, so the soil will have to be dug up and improved for anything to be happy at all.  Lucky for me, I can enlist the help of my son…growing your own labor is definitely recommended (results may vary…)

Have I mentioned I am not a gardener??  I want plants of the set-it-and-forget-it variety.  Hopefully the perennials that I bought won’t be too fickle.

I also did a scaled sketch to see what else I would have room for in terms of planters etc.  I know I want a pair of planters to flank the door.  Someday, I might add some lattice or a little pergola over the door so I can grow some vines of some sort, but today is not that day. :)

I’ll want some planters with tallish evergreens and maybe a trellis to screen part of the driveway view and create almost a walled garden effect.  And I’m on the hunt for the right solution that doesn’t cost a fortune and can be moved in the winter to allow room for snow pileup…one of the joys of living in New England.  

I want some seating, obviously, so I can enjoy this little spot. And a table for my ever-present glass or mug of tea.  I can envision working out here in the heat of summer.  We have no AC and although my office stays quite comfortable in the summer due to it being at basement level and on the northeast corner of the house, having a patio to catch some breezes will be nice!

I’m also day-dreaming about a water feature of some kind…we’ll see.

So that’s this week…here are some of the plants that followed me home (alas, the gardenias were gone, but they were’t for this patio anyway). This week I have to study up on the care and feeding of these babies so they stand a chance of survival.

Please visit the page for the One Room Challenge HERE for inspiration and updates from all the participants! And follow on IG #oneroomchallenge and #bhgorc.